Sio William: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSio William: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3) — In Committee[Sitting date: 29 May 2014. Volume:699;Page:18504. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Su’a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): Thank you for the opportunity. May I just respond briefly to some statements made earlier by the Associate Minister of Local Government when he said that about $3000 of savings will be made to developers per unit as a result of the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill (No 3). I have to ask the Minister whether he can take a call and guarantee that those savings will be passed on to homebuyers. We heard from the Tauranga District Council also that in its estimation there could perhaps be savings of about $750 per unit. Mind you Auckland Council submitted that the savings it was estimating would be about $1000 per unit. If I were the developer I would be asking myself whether I could realistically pass those savings on to the homebuyer.That is the challenge we want to put squarely on the forehead of that particular Minister now. He needs to provide guarantees. We will help him by supporting this bill to make sure that he lives up to the Government’s promise of building more houses. As shallow as these savings might be we want to be able to ensure that people who need homes are able to access affordable homes. I know that earlier today when my colleague Phil Twyford asked the Minister of Housing how he was going with building houses in those locations that are set apart in Auckland that Minister said they were moving at a cracking pace. That was after how many years in Government?Hon Member: 6 years.Su’a WILLIAM SIO: Six long years. That was also after the Government had recognised that there is a housing crisis. If that is the Government’s cracking pace and still there are no houses being built today then we need to know whether it is quite serious about it. I want to come to the Supplementary Order Papers—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): The debate is not about housing all right?Su’a WILLIAM SIO: I beg to differ.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No.Su’a WILLIAM SIO: OK. Look let me then go to Labour’s Supplementary Order Paper 460 in my name where we are asking this Committee to pass into legislation this Supplementary Order Paper which ensures that one of the schedules in that clause—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): No the schedules are in Part 1. We are on Part 2. We have covered the schedules in Part 1 and we had the debate on clauses 4 to 73 and schedules 1 to 10—Su’a WILLIAM SIO: Part 2 “Amendments to other enactments”.The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): —so you can talk to amendments—Su’a WILLIAM SIO: Under Part 2 there are amendments to the Local Electoral Act amendments to the Local Government (Auckland Council) Act 2009—Eugenie Sage: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. Could I seek some clarification. You said that the schedules are in relation to Part 1 but Part 2 actually refers to schedule 8 schedule 9 and schedule 10 so are some of the schedules not related to Part 2?The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I am just seeking advice because my advice differs and I do not want to put you wrong. Can you just bear with me a moment. The member may well be right. Just to clarify the points that have been raised by the point of order the schedules that can be included in Part 2 are schedules 8 9 and 10—all right? OK?Su’a WILLIAM SIO: In terms of schedule 8 “Amendments to Local Electoral Act 2001” there were some issues raised in terms of whether a person can hold more than one position if they are on a local board and also hold a position on the licensing trust as opposed to holding a position on another local board. I want to say that I do not think that this bill goes far enough in ensuring that conflicts of interest are avoided when a person who holds a local board position in one area holds another position on a local board of a subsequent area. There was also debate in public submissions relating to that particular part of the bill on whether a person holding a local board position can also hold a council position and whether a person holding either one of those positions can also hold a position on the district health board. I ask the Minister whether he would like to get up on his feet and make some comments about how we prevent potential conflicts of interest in terms of people who may hold more than one position on a local board the council or the district health board. That is a significant part of that particular schedule.In terms of schedule 9 “Amendments to Local Government (Auckland Council) Act 2009” the proposal by the Government is to replace section 12(3) with a new section 12(3) that reads: “A local board does not have separate legal standing from the Auckland Council and therefore without limitation may not—(a) acquire hold or dispose of property; or (b) enter into contracts; or (c) appoint suspend or remove employees; or (d) commence or be a party to or be heard in legal proceedings.” After section 12(3) this schedule will insert: “(4) Nothing in this section limits the responsibility of a local board to make the decisions of the Auckland Council that are allocated to it in accordance with section 16.” I suppose that that needs to be made clear.There were submitters who raised the concern that by imposing local boards as part of this Government’s amalgamation agenda throughout the country what is happening is that there is the potential for this Government to therefore replace competent democratic existing district councils and local territorial authorities with a local board. Although Auckland Council might now be finding its way through that particular structure and learning that yes it is giving local boards certain amounts of powers—probably a little bit more than the old existing community boards had—they definitely do not have the same powers as those held by a council. So the fear and the concern that was raised by some submitters was that they do not want to have this Government impose local boards as a replacement for existing competent district councils. In fact it goes back to the argument that there is strong and growing opposition to this Government’s amalgamation agenda. It also goes back to the earlier discussion that we had in Part 1 about this Government looking to ensure that it imposes its will on local government in terms of service delivery.There are existing local government bodies today I want to say that have strong arguments and a strong case put forward as to why they should not be amalgamated because they are currently able to deliver services in a shared way without the imposition of this Government legislating that for them. I name the Bay of Plenty region in particular. The concern that it would have is that it has a strong case that it is able to work together manage its assets etc. but by imposing amalgamation on it without meaningful contribution or input by the residents and ratepayers what we are essentially telling it is that its existing way of doing things is no good. Well who is this Government to judge that particular region when it is managing multibillion-dollarassets in terms of the ports and is able to sustain itself? Who are we to make that judgment?What I can say based on the Auckland Council experience is that if this Government continues in its relentless misguided attempt to amalgamate and to force those amalgamations on the region what the Bay of Plenty can look forward to is the loss of expertise the loss of the environmental expertise that it currently has the loss of leadership and the loss of the vision for that particular region. This Government does not have a vision for that region let alone a vision for the country so how on earth can it do that? I say that it would be wrong for this Government to continue along at this pace without making those required amendments to improve on this bill.As I said at the beginning we want to help this Government to keep its promise to build more houses. We have laid down the gauntlet in a challenge to it to build 100000 houses within 10 years. We want to see that happen rather than have the rhetoric that it has been trying to fool New Zealanders with.