Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill

We come first to the debate on Part 1. Part 1 is the debate on clauses 3 to 61, “Amendments to Fisheries Act 1996”, and the Schedule. The question is that Part 1 stand part.

I shall take a short call for what should be a relatively uneventful set of exchanges in the committee. This bill is on an area that I’ve sought to distinguish myself in—that is consensus, shared interests, and finding common ground in the area of natural resources and fisheries. It’s important that we acknowledge that this is part of an international effort, and, indeed, recently, I was in Honiara on behalf of our Government. A great deal of interest was directed towards New Zealand as to when we would actually pass this legislation to enable us to stand with a bunch of other nations.

We need to be mindful, as the legislation is implemented, that future leaders in the bureaucracy maintain a sense of balance, because the fishing industry, as you well know, is a wildlife industry, and from time to time certain lapses do take place, but, by and large, I think all members of the committee realise that our reputation as a fishing nation, our reputation internationally, is second to none, and I see very little reason as to why our committee stage should be protracted. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Thank you, Minister for Oceans and Fisheries, for those introductory remarks about working towards consensus. I’m very pleased to hear that. My first question is relating to the changes from the Primary Production Committee. I note that there are no Amendment Papers on this bill, so we can look at the tracked-change version of the bill in front of us.

The first change is at clause 29. This is regarding new section 113HA, “Criteria that must be met before international fishing permit is issued”. The vessel must be registered, and then there is a change from the select committee that the applicant vessel must be authorised by a relevant foreign country. It says, “For an international fishing permit … the applicant vessel must be authorised by the relevant foreign country to fish within that country’s national fisheries jurisdiction.” I take that to mean that if New Zealand was looking at issuing a permit, say, just for example, to a Norwegian vessel, that Norwegian vessel has to be authorised to fish in Norway. I’d just like confirmation that that is the Minister’s expectation as well, and if he would like to comment at all on the discussion that the select committee had on that issue.

Thank you, Mr Chair. I have a number of questions for the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries. I’m going to start with clause 5. This is seeking to amend Part 4, specifically section 32. Now, this relates to “Criteria of eligibility to receive provisional catch history for quota management stock”. One of the interesting things that seems to flow through the bill is a change in the descriptor when it comes to, largely, the chief executive being authorised to make certain decisions, so I’d like to point the Minister to what is a proposed new subsection (2A) and specifically paragraph (b), subparagraph (ii). This is talking about the ability for the chief executive to basically take an action or make a decision, and it refers to “what in the judgement of the chief executive was a valid authority to take the stock using a New Zealand ship”, and it flows on from there.

My question to the Minister is: is the use of the word “judgement” appropriate because, throughout this bill, there are actually different descriptors that that are used? If we look at clause 7, it’s talking about “in the chief executive’s opinion”. I think elsewhere it’s talking about “in the consideration of the chief executive”. So this is about consistency of language and whether or not there is a specific reason as to why there is a difference in utilising the word “judgement” when it comes to clause 5, “consideration” elsewhere in the legislation or in the bill, and “chief executive’s opinion” in clause 7. So I’m wanting to know about the inconsistent approach and then the rationale behind that.

The other part of that is, in some parts of the bill but not in clause 5, there is, effectively, if not a list, a sense of direction provided as to how the chief executive would go about—or things that they would need to consider in exercising consideration, opinion, or judgment. And so my follow-on question to the Minister is: what’s provided in the bill to drive the decision-making process that the chief executive would undertake when engaging in things, particularly when it comes to judgment? I don’t know. It might be that the use of the word “judgement” is consistent elsewhere in the bill or in other legislation, but I’d be interested in the Minister’s thoughts on that.

If I can refer first to the question from the former Minister the Hon Rachel Brooking, I am assured by the officials that before any vessel goes wandering off fishing in international waters—or, indeed, in other nations’ waters—our officials will need to establish that they have a legal entitlement to actually fish; perish the thought it should be in Norway, but in more proximate nations.

On the question of Mr Utikere’s question, which, really, poses the question, possibly of trust or confidence, about the judgment that will be exercised by the bureaucracy in the future, I think the bill clearly states that it’s within the ambit of his or her decision-making power that they take account of actual fishing history. As I said, from time to time, fishing boats do find themselves in a situation where enforcement action might be taken against them. But, by and large, these are relatively insignificant matters, and the director-general needs to balance such blemishes against the ongoing need for New Zealand to have a flourishing and robust industry. I have every confidence that our bureaucracy will not be swayed by faddish ideology.

Thank you, Mr Chairman. Greetings to the Minister in the chair, the Hon Shane Jones, who, amongst other things, used to be the chief executive of Te Ohu Kaimoana and also an ambassador for New Zealand in respect of the Pacific territories under McCully, when Murray McCully was the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

My question arises from clause 42, and thereabouts, of the bill. The underlying ill that has attempted to be remedied by this bill is illegal, unreported fishing in the Pacific area in particular. We don’t have much of a problem with this in New Zealand, because we’re well able to police our exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in a way that Pacific Islands find difficult.

Illegal activity both within other countries’ EEZs and on the high seas is something that worries New Zealand. I am sure that the Minister in the chair has seen the control room—I forget which Pacific nation houses it—but it takes data from American sources and other sources, including New Zealand, and monitors the place of fishing fleets in the Pacific. It relies in part upon transponders that are on each of those fishing vessels throughout the region. That information is beamed up to satellites, comes into the control centre, and then there is an ability for those monitoring fishing in the region to see where vessels are. But occasionally, the vessels go dark. They turn off their transponders and they stop transmitting data. That is an indicator, sometimes, of illegal activity, where the fishing boats are turning off their transponders so as not to be visible to the countries in whose EEZs they might be about to move into, and, as a consequence, this facilitates, or is part of, the illegal and unreported fishing that we have in the region. I had hoped the Minister might pay attention to the question.

CHAIRPERSON (Greg O’Connor): I was just going to say, if you could just hold up, I’ll stop the clock, and we’ll just wait while—the Minister’s obviously taking advice, so—

Hon Shane Jones: Yes, I am following, Mr Parker.

Hon DAVID PARKER: Thank you, and I’m sure the Minister knows more about these issues than I do. So we have this problem in the Pacific, where the most important financial resource, not just a food source but a financial resource, in the Pacific Islands is often their fishing resource. The revenue they make from fishing is sometimes their highest source of revenue to Government, and one of the highest sources of income to the countries. So the protection of that resource, both in a sustainability sense but also in terms of maximising the economic reward that can be returned to the Pacific countries, is absolutely one of the most important things that happens in the Pacific.

I’m supportive of this legislation, but my questions for the Minister are, firstly: is he concerned about vessels going dark and illegal activity in the Pacific? I can recount a discussion that I had, when I was Minister of fisheries, with Talley’s. I asked them why Talley’s had stopped participating in fishing day schemes in the Pacific—that’s a scheme under which a company bids for a number of rights to fish on a certain number of days, which is a proxy for a control on volume—and I was told by the senior people within that organisation that they can only fish for 24 hours in a day, which was, effectively, them saying that there is fraud in the Pacific Island fishing schemes, with some people pushing the boundaries of the rules and fishing when they’re not.

We’ve got dark vessels, we’ve got other vessels that are fishing with fishing day permits in different countries, but they’re not abiding by the terms of those. Those are my first two questions about the Minister’s concerns about that, but if I could have an answer to that, and then I have a follow-up question.

I’d like a few minutes to explain this. The Goldilocks zone in Pacific fisheries is 10 degrees above and 10 degrees below the Equator. Coming south from 10 degrees is a large fishery. It’s often the albacore fishery, and the small Mosquito boats are continually working in international waters. A response from New Zealand and the Pacific nations was to require such vessels to unload their catch in ports, thus enabling investigators or officers to board and check. This is an ongoing challenge to our neck of the woods because not all nations abide by that. The conditions upon the Mosquito fleet, if I can speak figuratively, are such that very few New Zealanders would survive on those vessels.

Now, coming back to the largest pelagic fishery in the entire world, which is managed in the following way: the nations belonging to the Nauru agreement have bound together, including Tokelau and, as an associate, the Cook Islands. They run a scheme that you purchase days and you can catch as much fish as you like within that day. If, however, you catch nothing, then you’ve paid for an infertile day. They have also now—and Micronesia is leading the pack—created a situation that they will not sell entitlements to any fishing nation who does not bring the vessel back to a port and disgorge from the actual vessel that’s caught the fish on to a larger mother ship, for want of a better expression. They are also moving towards a situation that they will not sell days to nations that focus exclusively on taking fish from the high seas. This piece of legislation is enabling us to join with other nations to board and inspect those nations that are taking fish from the high seas, which is administered under the United Nations. The Primary Production Committee, of its own volition, created this body of work, and one of the outcomes that we are addressing and passing today does enable New Zealand to achieve some of the outcomes contemplated by the various working parties of the United Nations.

We do have a problem with various nations turning off their transponders and trying to avoid detection. And the money that’s recently been spent through our Air Force does enable New Zealand to participate in initiatives called Operation Kurukuru and other such things, where the French, the Aussies, the Americans, and the Kiwis from time to time work together. We do spend over $8 million to $9 million in Honiara at the FFA, the Forum Fisheries Agency, as an adjunct organisation of the broader Pacific Islands Forum. We have been the leading nation in that regard. Each year, we are endeavouring to boost our institutional investment in the island nation States. I don’t want in this Parliament to cast aspersion upon any particular island nation State, but I’d encourage those of us who are interested in geopolitics in the Pacific to follow it assiduously.

On the question of what practically is likely to happen now we have these powers—we’re giving, essentially, to the Ministry for Primary Industries these powers—we will now increase our ability to surveil our own fleet, which I must say is modest in size, although Sealord, for a long period of time, has had the wheel watch, catching alfonsino, catching orange roughy, out of Mauritius and out of Cape Town, in that part of the Indian Ocean. But that vessel is not registered in New Zealand; it’s registered in the Cook Islands. So although we have a modest fleet, there is a huge expectation that Kiwis—a fishing nation; clean pair of hands—will continually lift the bar.

Flourishes aside, I genuinely believe, Mr Parker, that the efforts of the select committee do help us achieve a higher level of compliance and a higher level of acceptability and legitimisation when dealing with the vessels on the high seas.

Can I thank the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries for that explanation and for reminding me that it’s Honiara where this monitoring activity takes place. When I was in Honiara with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Rt Hon Winston Peters, last year, we inspected that facility. In another Pacific country, on more than one occasion, the local politicians, you could see, would have liked more of the fishing effort to have been carried out by their own people so that they could earn a wage from the fishing rather than just take a royalty on the fishing day.

There was recently an article that I read in a newspaper from a long-experienced Australian regulator of fisheries, who’s long lived in the Pacific—I forget her name. It was a very good article which contrasted the position in respect of small Island States compared to those that have the advantage of an association with France. I wasn’t aware of this until recently, but France, through their areas, have been more assiduous about ensuring the economic development benefits that can flow from fishing their own fish—“their” being the Pacific Island territory—through a fishing fleet that is French. I wondered whether the Minister had a view as to whether comparing the effectiveness of changes in this legislation, such as those which were found around section 42 in respect of this monitoring of the international fleet, might actually be better achieved if New Zealand and Australia assisted the Pacific Islands through support to, perhaps, buy a fleet leased to the Pacific Islands that could be used by those Pacific Islands to maximise the value they get from their own fishery.

So my question to the Minister is, first, that general one, and, secondly, because he probably is aware of more of this than I am, how the French do it.

It is absolutely true: we have a working relationship, obviously, with New Caledonia, and a number of us, from our Māori side, would know there is an incredibly close connection between the origins of the iwis and Taputapuātea, located in French Polynesia. The French Polynesians and the French nation State have zero tolerance for the international exploitation of the pelagic-fisheries resource in their sovereign waters—zero tolerance—and a similar situation subsists in New Caledonia, but there are ongoing debates as to where the maritime boundary is between Vanuatu.

The other thing I’d say is that in some of our Pacific Island nation neighbours, such as the Solomons, in Honiara, they have a thing called the archipelago fishery. Within that fishery, it is part of the sovereign waters, but, at all times, the nation States are seeking ways to boost the returns, because fisheries is now a currency of influence, which is why the Primary Production Committee actually came up with some very useful outcomes, which we’re about to pass today, and it puts more acid on New Zealand to ensure that our own pair of hands are clean.

In relation to upgrading fleets and such matters, then, obviously, we have a substantial budget through foreign affairs and a fair degree of that goes to fisheries. But I’m going to send a warning of caution: unless we are continually investing and doing things that are of practical economic assistance to our Pacific neighbours, do not be surprised if they walk on by the traditional donors and go to the new donor partners. Recently, we had Transform Aqorau, a brilliant academic from the Solomon Islands, who spoke just up the road, and he warned New Zealand: less of the Oxfam approach and more of the practical infrastructure approach.

My final contribution in response to that is I suggest he reads my speech this morning.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Thank you, Minister. I actually really enjoyed the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries’ explanation for some of the contributions made by the Hon David Parker. My question is along a similar vein, having not sat through the select committee stage and not been part of the Primary Production Committee but knowing that this bill originated a little while ago. I wanted to check with the Minister: does the Minister see this bill being consistent with the Agreement under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea on the Conservation and Sustainable use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas beyond National Jurisdiction, or BBNJ?

Because I’m assuming, when we’re looking at, I guess, in some ways clause 4 of Part 1, which is around the interpretation, predominantly this bill is around illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing, I wondered if the Minister has got any advice on checking that the terms of that are consistent with what our general trajectory is under that particular agreement. Particularly, I’m looking at Parts 3 and 4 of that agreement, the BBNJ agreement. So, yeah, I’m just checking with the Minister on whether this legislation largely is in line with that, noting that the bill was introduced before the agreement was signed, but now the agreement has been signed and has gone through some of the review process.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Like the previous speaker, Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan, I did find that interplay or the exchange between the Hon David Parker and the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries very interesting, so I have one question about that exchange, and I’ll then move to more sort of boring questions, really. That was an interesting exchange. There were quite a lot of Gothic terms involved, and the Minister was talking about fisheries being a currency of influence. But the select committee has made some helpful changes in that regard, and I was wondering if he could point us to the changes that the select committee has made that he was referring to in that exchange, over a series of questions. That would be helpful.

Then to my two more precise questions, which are still on clause 29, and there’s a change that the select committee has made to new section 113HB, at the start. It’s that “The chief executive may, but is not required to, issue an international fishing permit, taking into account—”, and then there are some things listed and there’s what looks like rewording in the rest of that section. I was just wondering if the Minister can confirm that that’s his interpretation, as well—those changes to new section 113HB—that it’s just supposed to be a clarification that the chief executive may, but is not required to, take into account the non-compliance—

Hon Shane Jones: What section is she talking about?

Hon RACHEL BROOKING: —and that the rest of the wording is just a rewording. So that’s on page 19 of the bill, in section 113HB.

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): Section 113HB—yes.

Hon RACHEL BROOKING: Yes. So that’s one more precise question, and then another more precise question is going to page 24 of the bill—so clause 42 inserts a new section. This is one that the select committee has made a change to, again, and this is what I am focusing on. It changes new section 113UA, “Investigation of serious violations: power to detain vessel at port”—we were discussing that earlier—and in subsection (5), it says that the chief executive may direct the release of the vessel. Now, this is where my question comes in, at paragraph (a), because it says that they may detain “if they believe on reasonable grounds that the serious violation took place on the high seas, on request of the vessel’s flag State;”. This is a picky question, but is it that the vessel’s flag State has requested the vessel to do the serious violation, or is it that the vessel’s flag State has requested that the vessel doing the serious violation be taken into the port? So it’s really a question of grammar, and I think it would be useful to have the answer to that on the Hansard.

It may be that an amendment is needed on that point. I’m always disturbed that we are in urgency, at the moment, in committee stage and running right on to a third reading, and can I recommend against doing that, because sometimes there are little changes that may need to be made. I’m not saying that this is the one that needs a change, but it is good practice to have a couple of days whereby any small amendments can be made, if they need to be made.

Kia orana, Mr Chair. I just have two other questions. I would be grateful if the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries was able to respond to the earlier issue that I’d asked around the use of judgment, consideration, and opinion of the chief executive and the need or otherwise for perhaps consistency and, if not, then the rationale behind that.

The first of my other questions actually follows on from what the Hon Rachel Brooking has just alluded to. It’s just the next section down, new section 113UB, in clause 42. I think what’s really important is that the powers that are given for the purposes of search on a vessel whilst at port are alongside the Search and Surveillance Act, but they also are as permissive as they could be in the context of making sure that that liberty and the like is protected.

So I’d like to take the Minister to new section 113UB(3)(b). This is where a high-seas fishery inspector may “do 1 or more”—

CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): Can you give us the page number?

TANGI UTIKERE: This is on page 24 of the commentary from the select committee. So it’s subsection (3)(b), and it’s about taking “any sample of a thing that may be inspected, for forensic or other scientific testing:”. My question to the Minister is: does this provision provide for an item in its entirety to actually be taken? Because it might be that, you know, for the purpose of exercising the search powers, an item may, for example, need to be seized for the purpose of this particular clause, but there’s nothing contained in this section that would allow, as I could see it, for the taking of an item in its entirety. It only talks about a sample of an item which may be inspected, which does not lead to an item in its entirety to be taken.

The other stuff around remote access, that’s not relevant in this particular context, but it’s in terms of taking something in its entirety is really only subsection (3)(d), that relates to “a copy of a record or a document that may be inspected.” So my point is not trying to be limiting but rather being empowering and whether there is provision contained that allows for a specific item in its entirety, which may be a small item, but to be taken for the purposes of that particular section.

The other question that I have is just in relation to page 28 of the select committee report and commentary. This is clause 48. This talks about the “Publication of decisions on administrative penalties”. I like the sense that there is going to be some accountability and transparency around this. There are particular aspects or criteria that the chief executive must do for each provision or each time a penalty is imposed—you know, the location, the amount of the penalty, etc.; no issue with that. But there’s nothing there that guides a particular time frame within which these decisions must actually be, effectively, uploaded to an internet site. Is the intention in drafting this that actually there is not any time frame, that it could be on an annual basis, that it could be—I don’t know. It just seems to be very silent as to a time frame within which these actions must be taken.

I mean, they’ll be taken by the chief executive, but it seems to me the purpose around transparency and accountability is putting them up on the website, but there’s no guidance as to when that would happen.

Despite my best efforts of avoiding protraction, I shall stand again. In relation to the former Minister the Hon Rachel Brooking’s question, I’m advised that, yes, the change clarifies that the chief executive officer may take those matters into account. But I think it’s really important that we’re going to have, from time to time—before I talk about the Southern Ocean—times where people associated without a nation State may play a role and find wrongdoing upon foreign-flag vessels.

For a foreign-flag vessel, the ultimate authority lies with the State that owns the flag. The nation State of New Zealand has no authority to endlessly take possession of, control of, or hold a foreign-flag vessel. We do have, through this legislation, authority to go and inspect, request further information, and help the host nation do the check and undertake the analysis when in port. But it’s important that this rather obscure but very important principle be borne in mind. The two cornerstone pillars pertaining to this type of fishing are the United Nations fishing agreement but also the law of the sea, and Kiwis were involved in constructing the legislation or the principles that passed into international law in the law of the sea.

In respect of the matter pertaining to biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction, the trajectory is an open question, and it is yet to enter into force for New Zealand to ratify and we may need new implementation legislation.

Now, I want to talk about where this is likely to bite. We have vessels, along with a host of other vessels, in the Southern Ocean. We don’t have any vessels any longer operating out of New Zealand in the broader pelagic fishery. We do have a vessel from time to time in the trans-Tasman waters, but this is more focused on those vessels extracting resource out of the high seas or, indeed, helping host nations. But in relation to the Southern Ocean, I’d remind ourselves that we have a lucrative fishery down there called the Patagonian toothfish. It does bring people out in boils sometimes but I love eating this stuff and I’ve had numerous fillets over the years.

There have been ongoing calls for greater surveillance of our Kiwi vessels down there, and, indeed, the navy goes down there and assists, along with Australia, to check the quality of the conduct. You may recall, several years ago, a vessel was chased all the way to Cape Town by the Australian navy—six, seven, or eight years ago. And it’s to the extent that we would have been in that position that these powers today give our Government officials considerably more—less influence but more authority to chase those offenders. If the offender has been flagged by another nation State such as Russia, the ultimate authority over the vessel lies with Russia.

Yes, thank you. Look, I thank the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries for his comments and it’s useful commentary—thank you. My question was one about grammar on page 24, not so much about chasing ships around. And it’s just the way that sentence reads. So this is at the top of page 24, clause 42, new section 113UA(5)(a), and it’s a change made by the Primary Production Committee. So it’s “if they believe on reasonable grounds that the serious violation took place on the high seas, on request of the vessel’s flag State”. So it’s just whether that could be interpreted as meaning that the vessel’s flag State wanted the serious violation to take place, as opposed to the vessel’s flag State requesting the release of the vessel or the detention of the vessel. That’s all I was asking about.

Look, several years ago, the New Zealand Navy was involved in an incident during the time that Murray McCully was the Minister of Foreign Affairs, so we have had experience in this. Indeed, at this very point in time, there’s a stand-off between some of the Latin American States and fleets coming from Asia. At the end of the day, the ability, and I quote—I’m going to go right to where the Hon Rachel Brooking is referring to, paragraphs (5)(a) and (b) of new section 113UA, inserted by clause 42. The limits of our director-general’s authority is driven by the overarching significance of the law of the sea, where the ultimate authority does lie with the flag-State nation.

Now, in the event that we want to give ourselves more authority if we felt that was a rogue nation ruining the sustainability of the fishery or interfering in a nefarious way with our relationships in the Pacific, I dare say that that solution doesn’t lie in this Parliament; that solution lies in upgrading the agreements that all nations are a party to.

There’s one issue that I would like to follow up with the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries arising from his recent comments from the chair. He, I thought wisely, said to the House that the future of the demilitarised nature of the South Pacific is linked to the prosperity and success of Pacific Island nations, and that those Pacific Island nations will look to other nations that might seek to influence them—that was a relevant document, Minister—in respect of associations that might lead to the future militarisation of the Pacific and a Pacific that is different to that which we currently experience. The Minister, I thought, was referring in part to the necessary development assistance that comes into the Pacific Islands from Australia, the United States, New Zealand, Japan, the European Union, China, and various other countries. The Minister will be aware that most USA aid programmes have now been cancelled—funding withdrawn from them—and I know that his own leader, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who has quite a proud record of increasing development assistance into the Pacific under Labour-led administrations, was unsuccessful, in current straitened times, even in maintaining foreign aid at current levels into the Pacific.

I raise to the Minister an idea I have floated, because I know the Minister of Defence, who was here very recently listening to this debate, has also had difficulty getting the money that she thinks is necessary to increase spending into hard power. So there is probably a need going forward to increase both hard- and soft-power spending, and both are hard to get. So I refer the Minister to an idea in the document that he has now before him that maybe the way to leverage both is to agree that, as a principle, we need to lift both and tie lifts in, one to the other. I think that would improve both the politics and the outcomes if we could, across this House, work together to lift expenditures in both of those areas. I know that there are disagreements across the House politically, but there’s actually no disagreement, really, in respect of what we should be doing in the Pacific. The Rt Hon Chris Hipkins is also on record as saying we need to replace the frigates, which implies an increase in military expenditure as a percentage of GDP.

So the question that I would ask the Minister is: has he given consideration as to whether, in addition to these sorts of illegal fishing measures, really, the key to sustainable use of the fisheries is an increase in development assistance into the Pacific to help them fund the capital fleet, and maybe the idea that I’ve just put before him that you leverage one off the other so that you have, as a principle, that every increase in hard-power expenditure is matched by an increase in soft-power expenditure and diplomacy and overseas development assistance into the Pacific?

Thank you to the honourable member, and it’s difficult to disagree. I just want to remind everyone: we, generally, are going to see these powers played out, in the Pacific region, when our military assets, such as they are, are deployed as a part of a collective effort. Recently, those efforts were called Kurukuru, which means, in Māori, “to strike”. That’s the French, Kiwis, Aussies, and Americans, and it’s beyond cavil that we need to do as much as possible.

But there is a larger debate: how will we fund more surveillance and interventions? And that goes to the aid question—to ensure that when we dress up aid, under whatever title you want to call it, it’s done in such a way that it’s boosting the resilience of our friends and the Governments of the Pacific, because they have options. If they feel that what they’re being offered is not actually enabling them to enjoy other resilience—this is not the 1960s and 1970s and 1980s and 1990s; we are regarded as a traditional donor. Other nations seeking to expand their influence in the Pacific are regarded as the new donors. The new donors are proving to be inordinately more pragmatic than the traditional donors, such as New Zealand.

Thank you, Mr Chair, and thank you to the Minister for Oceans and Fisheries for responding to my previous question around the agreement on marine biodiversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction as well—much appreciated. I’m going to move on to a new clause. I guess, apologies to the Minister in advance, because I’m actually really enjoying hearing the Minister’s responses and also the experience the Minister has in this area.

To start with, I’m looking at clause 29, so that’s section 113H replaced, which is around the issuing of the high-seas fishing permit. Forgive my ignorance—feel free to direct me to additional readings or answer succinctly—but I wondered: when we are issuing a high-seas fishing permit, is there a quota attached to that? Do you get quotas when you are fishing in the high seas? It’s an area I genuinely don’t know.

I’m also curious because I see that one of the reasons that we are changing this particular section from high-seas fishing permit to international fishing permit is because we are now including national fishery jurisdictions of a foreign country on top of just simply high seas. I want to check with the Minister whether that’s an indication of something we might potentially see in either future trade agreements as sort of built into a trade agreement of being the eligibility or the authority by the relevant foreign countries or trade partners to fish within their national jurisdiction, or, alternatively, we’re going to be seeing agreements on the line of the US Tuna Treaty Amendments to Annex II most recently, where we’re going to be seeing some of these sorts of agreements coming up.

Just on the subject of a quota, I also wanted to check in terms of—sorry, going back just a little bit—clause 7, which is section 35 amended, we’re talking about the quota management system. I want to check whether now the new definition of commercial fisher and the quota—is quota still transferrable under the new definition? Because one of the things we heard yesterday, for example, when we were debating the dairy bill, was that quotas aren’t transferrable. So you can’t on-sell the quota. So I want to just check with the Minister for clarity that quotas in the case of the quota management system in the context of fishing quota are still transferable.

So those are my sort of three questions around whether there is a quota involved when we’re looking at high-seas fishing permits, whether we are going to be seeing more interactions or more inclusions of being able to fish in another country’s national jurisdiction as part of this amendment, and also whether quotas are still transferrable under the new definition.

Right, New Zealand belongs to a host of regional fishing management organisations. Indeed, one of them, set up in 2009-10, deals with a range of fisheries throughout the Pacific, including the mackerel off the coast of Chile, right through to the residual opportunities for boats to fish in the trans-Tasman waters.

When a nation is entitled to extract a fraction of a defined fishery resource, their fraction, their quota, is under the auspices of what we call regional fishing management organisations (RFMOs). Yes, there is the ability for transferability of quota. That explains why, if I’m not mistaken, it’s Chile who’s ended up with an inordinately large degree of mackerel fishery beyond their sovereign entitlement, because it’s being transferred from other nations who are highly unlikely ever to use it. For those reasons, recently, New Zealand had the opportunity to catch quota allocated to Australia. So that’s the reference, but it does not take place under any other regime other than our participation in what are called RFMOs.

On the question of international water fisheries, I want people to bear in mind something like the Ross Sea. That is where our Kiwi vessels are active. These powers, in the statute flowing from the select committee inquiry, give sharper authority and more certainty to the ambit of how our fisheries officials are able to police our own vessels and have a go at other vessels in the Ross Sea who undoubtedly are flouting regulations. However, at the end of the day, the capacity of Wellington to control that vessel depends on the flag State, and if the flag State—it has happened, in the days of Murray McCully—flips the bird, then our options lie at a higher court than this Parliament.

I move, That debate on this question now close.