The Green Party wants to water down emergency legislation setting up a special regime for speeding the earthquake recovery in Canterbury but the rest of Parliament intends to pass it into law tonight.
The Government introduced the Canterbury Earthquake Response and Recovery Bill with the backing of all parties in Parliament today but the Green Party limited its support for what it calls "shock and awe" legislation to the first reading.
It plans to move amendments later tonight to make what it calls an extreme law more modest.
The House agreed to sit late tonight if required to pass the bill through all stages, clearing the way for the civil defence state of emergency to be lifted tomorrow.
Already bowing to Labour's concerns about the bill's draconian powers for ministers to pass regulations that override other laws, the Government has agreed that these orders in council will be subject to the scrutiny of Parliament's regulations review select committee.
It has also agreed that the Opposition is consulted before an order is made and that the legislation will expire in April 2012 instead of three years later.
Labour's environment spokesmean Charles Chauvel admitted that aspects of the bill disturbed him and Labour would consider some of the Greens' proposed amendments, but Labour intended to take a non-partisan position on the bill given the scrutiny safeguards it had secured.
The Maori Party is seeking further assurances around accountability and has asked for Maori representation on the commission.
The legislation gives ministers powers to relax or exempt vital reconstruction or repair work from 22 other laws for the next 18 months and ministers' recommendations cannot be challenged in any court.
It also sets up a recovery commission to coordinate the recovery work and is designed to provide a seamless transition from the state of emergency imposed after the 7.1 earthquake jolted the region 10 days ago causing widespread damage, roughly estimated at $4 billion.
Introducing the bill, Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee said
to facilitate the recovery a mechanism was needed that made specific changes to a range of laws.
The bill would be the House's expression of a strong desire to remove beauraucracy that slowed down recovery work and would help Canterbury get over and get past the earthquake.
Each order in council would allow the Government to act quickly with Parliamentary support and each regulation would have to meet the bill's tests to facilitate the response to the earthquake.
The makeup of the recovery commission would mean it was Canterbury people who made the decisions, with the Government standing behind them.
Labour leader Phil Goff said this was not a time for partisan squabbling but to help people get their lives back together without needless delay.
"We understand that this is not business as usual, that we need an efficient and swift response," he said.
While it was important to streamline the process it was equally important not to remove safeguards that maintain standards and avoid cowboys exploiting the situation and ensure people losing their rights are listened to.
Environment Minister Nick Smith, who is one of five ministers empowered by the legislation, assured the House the powers would be used sparingly and said the only practical way forward was through such a generic empowering bill.
The earthquake released energy equivalent to 1000 Hiroshima atomic bombs and the bill had to be considered in the context of the quake's scale, he argued.
It was an exceptional bill in exceptional circumstances and designed to take the region smoothly from emergency to recovery.
The challenge was going to get harder not easier, with very difficult judgments to be made about heritage buildings and what areas were safe to be built on again.
Decisions made over the next few months would affect Canterbury for a century or more, "getting the framework right for these decisions is vital".
The recovery commission would lead the work and make sure central and local government worked in harmony, Dr Smith said, and the bill would remove the need for retrospective consents for demolitions that had already occurred or for inevitable discharges into waterways.
However, the Greens say the bill still goes too far and gives ministers too much power without accountability.
They plan to move amendments limiting the bill's life to six months and the number of laws it can override, allowing for swifter parliamentary scrutiny of the regulations and subjecting the recovery commission to the Official Information Act.
Christchurch-based Green MP Kennedy Graham said the party entered the debate in a constructive spirit and agreed that it was not business as usual in Canterbury. But the bill accorded enormous powers to the Government, including full protection from legal liability for any act of omission or commission, and he questioned if it was out of proportion to the circumstances.
It allowed central government to suspend virtually any piece of legislation.
"If we are out of emergency and into recovery, why are we according emergency powers and why are those powers so very sweeping?" Mr Graham asked. "If all we are seeking to do is expedite reconstruction then let us find proper ways of doing this that are proportionate to the challenge.
"We do not have to potentially suspend virtually the entire New Zealand statue book to rebuild Christchurch."
People were concerned the city would be built too quickly with insufficient thought to design and planning and it was not enough to rely on trust, he said.
"It does appear to us that the Government has been galvanised in this by its broad economic philosophy: do not let the gdp fall; do not let the tourists become concerned; rebuild as fast as possible; time is money."
© Newsroom 2010
