Wagner Nicky: General DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWagner Nicky: General Debate[Sitting date: 25 February 2015. Volume:703;Page:1914. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon NICKY WAGNER (Associate Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery): It has been a significant week for New Zealand and it is only Wednesday. On Sunday we had the 4th anniversary of the Canterbury earthquakes and yesterday we made the commitment for our Defence Force to train in Iraq. Both provide us with an opportunity to reflect on being a Kiwi what we value in New Zealand and why we need to protect our people and our quality of life.Rebuilding Canterbury so that it is a great place to live work and raise a family is one of the Government’s priorities. The 4th anniversary on Sunday gave us an opportunity to take stock of how far we have come. There is a new normal in Christchurch in Canterbury. What we think about what we care about and what we do is different now. People are more precious; things less so. We take pleasure in the small things like a smooth road—things that we took for granted in the past. We are more creative. We are more community-minded and public spaces and events are more popular.Physically there is huge change in our area. When you look you can see building everywhere. Roads are being repaired houses are being built and suburbs are being recreated. The central city newly focused on a cleaned and restored Avon/Ōtākaro River is coming alive. The anchor projects are taking shape. Businesses and organisations are returning to the town and there is a real buzz of activity.Everyone can see the physical rebuild but what about the people of Canterbury? Everyone has lost someone or something. Everyone has their own experience and their own story and everyone copes in a different way and in a different time frame. But as the Associate Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery I am concerned about the well-being of the community as a whole and how they feel about life. The latest research part of the All Right? campaign for greater Christchurch tells us that fewer people are now worried about having another big earthquake. Significantly fewer people are dealing with the things that happened as a result of the earthquakes. But in terms of well-being and community respondents feel better connected to greater Christchurch and more respondents reported regularly giving their time to help others.When we compare Christchurch with the rest of New Zealand in the local government Quality of Life Survey we see that across the six cities 82 percent of people rate their quality of life as positive and in Christchurch that figure is 80 percent. In those six cities 17 percent of people feel stressed most of the time and in Canterbury that figure is 19 percent. But the statistic that I found the most interesting is that across the six cities people tell us that “they have someone to turn to for help if they are faced with a serious illness or injury or needed emotional support during a difficult time”. In those six cities 92 percent of people feel that but in Christchurch the figure is 94 percent of people. So we do stick together. We are supporting each other.So we have made some progress but we have still got some way to go. But I think we are seeing a benefit in that people feel engaged and are participating in our community. Last weekend alone as well as the memorial services in the city we had a Cricket World Cup match a well-patronised fun run and disabled surfing. The ethnic communities had a soccer tournament and we had the Chinese New Year celebration and that all on top of our normal events. Cantabrians are out and about and enjoying themselves.We are championing creativity and the arts in our rebuild. We have the Gap Filler events and recently we had the Spectrum Street ArtFestival which will make Christchurch the leading city for street art in New Zealand. We have restored the Isaac Theatre Royal. We have got the Court Theatre running and performances in Hagley Park. There is something for everyone. While I am here I would like to draw the attention of the House to the public consultation on the new earthquake memorial. From an international call for ideas we got 330 proposals and six of those have been chosen. You can have your say online.