The ceasefire, or the attack if you would rather, was instigated by Minister Responsible for RMA Reform, Chris Bishop, via the first reading of the Resource Management (Freshwater And Other Matters) Amendment Bill.
The government’s latest foray into RMA reform contains a grab bag of its favourite resource management targets: sidelining the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management until it is replaced, aligning the consenting pathway for coal mining with other mineral extraction activities, changing significant natural areas regulations, and repealing several land slope and intensive winter grazing regulations.
"We need to acknowledge that New Zealand's farmers are some of, if not the, best in the world. Burying them under unnecessarily and unreasonably burdensome piles of regulations and compliance requirements is harmful for our economy — makes very little sense."
The government backed farmers to make "sensible, pragmatic choices" that boosted productivity and protected the environment at the same time, he said.
Which all sounds very reassuring, but Dunedin Labour MP Rachel Brooking was not having a bar of it.
"Destroy the environment. Keep going. Fast track's not enough," she interjected as Mr Bishop painted his vision of a bright new future.
"I hear the member over the other side going on simplistically and tritely about destroying the environment. This is not about that; this is about simplifying and reducing the red tape that holds our economy back, particularly our primary sector, from growing.
"I reject the proposition that you can have the economy or you can have the environment."
It would be fair to say that this riled up an already steaming Ms Brooking still further. She denied any interest at all in having trite discussions, but said much of what Mr Bishop had said matched that description.
Ms Brooking also took strong exception to the Bill being sent to the primary production select committee for consideration rather than the environment committee (on which she sits).
"What committee has always considered things to do with the Resource Management Act?," she asked.
"Oh, that would be, of course, the environment committee, that should be considering this, because the regulations that are being amended by this Bill are to do with protecting the environment and improving the environment by stopping pollution."
As Ms Brooking noted, sensibly, that the best and most efficient thing to do to stop pollution is to stop it from occurring in the first place, Northland National MP and beef and sheep farmer Grant McCallum, frustrated that his parade was being rained on, chipped in to say: "Farmers care too, by the way".
"I'm hearing farmers want clean rivers too — excellent news," Ms Brooking fired back.
"I'm very pleased to hear that, and they should be talking to the environment committee about that."
When it comes to the RMA Ms Brooking knows what she is talking about — she is a very experienced environmental lawyer.
But Taieri New Zealand First list MP Mark Patterson — and lifelong farmer — also knows more than a little about the subject. While he mistakenly called Ms Brooking "Rachel Boyack", he took issue with the notion that the primary production committee was not absolutely the right committee to be scrutinising the legislation.
"It is the fact that the environment committee stuffed it up so badly the first time around, because there weren't enough farmers or people that understood the implications of the things they were signing off, that we're in this place now," he claimed.
"Farmers do care about the environment, and to say anything else — I absolutely dispel that sentiment for anyone that may be raising it in this debate."
Mr Patterson went on to praise the amount of fencing, riparian planting and restoring wetlands which farmers — modestly not including himself — have done to look after the environment.
"The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment, Simon Upton, has just come out with a report on this, and he has said that the catchment-level solution is the only way forward here, that regulations that work within farm boundaries, catchments, and ecological systems do not."
Which remains to be debated — and it remains to be debated at the primary production committee, despite Ms Brooking’s best efforts.
Magical mystery tour
Mr Patterson sparked much amusement last Thursday as he answered New Zealand First colleague Jamie Arbuckle’s patsy question: "What update can he provide from his recent trip to the South Island?".
Quite apart from the fact that Mr Patterson actually lives in the South Island, he took listeners on an extensive tiki tour which prompted Speaker Gerry Brownlee to note: "Some of the answers from the Minister are almost as long as the trip—just try and get it a little tighter".
Mr Patterson also noted, with theatrical dismay: "I did get stuck in the Clinton pub on Friday night — those electric cars that you have issued us are problematic in rural areas."
It was going so well
Dunedin Green list MP Francisco Hernandez’s maiden speech last Thursday was going swimmingly, right up until the last paragraph.
"To my co-leaders, Marama and Chloe, and my caucus colleagues," he said, "I promise that I will fight with you ..." at which point the House dissolved into laughter.
That is what Mr Hernandez might end up doing, but he quickly corrected himself: "that I will fight alongside you for our planet, our Tiriti, and our people every single day".
