Ian McLean Green Scene Spokesperson for the Green Party

It is 2015. The newly-elected Government is proposing to sign off on oil exploration on Codfish Island, where most kakapo live, and in the McKenzie Basin, where most black stilts live.

The Minister of Natural Resources has given assurances the birds will be safe, because there's never been a single reported incident of threat to these birds from exploration activities.

Are we happy? They are delivering on an election promise, after all.

I doubt there is a single person in the country who thinks putting such iconic species at risk is justifiable.

Yet the estimated population of 55 Maui's dolphins is less than half the number of kakapo or black stilts alive today, and 3000 square km of the dolphins' protected area are being handed over for oil exploration.

Energy and Resources Minister Simon Bridges it is not appropriate to put a critically endangered species at risk just because they live in the sea and management options for them are more limited than for our iconic land birds. Your assurances they will be safe do not hold water.