Transcript

Elizabeth Craker (Convenor): So why does New Zealand need an organisation like ERMA?

Manuka Henare (ERMA): It’s very closely related, I think, to the Resource Management Act and the need to manage things in terms of our environment, and there is a whole flow on from that.

Val Orchard (ERMA): New Zealand has learned the hard way what can happen, particularly if new organisms come into the country without any kind of controls.

Now you only have to think of possums and rabbits, and also on the plant side, things like gorse and Clematis vitalba, that have crawled all over the forests and have strangled our native vegetation, to know that really we have to be very, very careful about what we do allow into the country, because it can escape and become a real pest.

Manuka Henare (ERMA): So one can see historically that the time has come for this. Previous to the HSNO Act, there were various acts – the Explosive Act and all sorts of other acts, which covered bits and pieces.

So as I understand it, the HSNO Act was an attempt to bring it all together under one umbrella – set up an agency, and set up an authority that will make decisions. That historically is where it all sits.