Leary IngridINGRID LEARY (Labour—Taieri): One thing that's really certain about what this Government is doing is they are putting up rates for ordinary New Zealanders; they are putting up rents for people who will be at the brunt of those costs ordinary New Zealanders; and they are setting up councils to fail. It is such a shameful day. I echo the words of my colleague Willie Jackson: this is such a shameful day.If we look at why the affordable water reforms were set up we had people dying from contaminated water in Havelock North. There were four deaths in 2016; there were 5500 people who got sick. This is a matter of fact; it is a matter of record. We're not making these stories up.Then we had last year stormwaters in Auckland. A lot of the waterways were blocked. We had 10000 properties affected. We had $1.5 billion worth of private insurance payouts so far—that's just so far. People saw cars swept down the road. Lots and lots of displacement lots of anxiety lots of mental health issues as a result of those storms. And guess what? With the repeal of this bill much of that problem is not going to be resolved. In fact the Auckland Council predicts that another 50000 properties are at risk if there is going to be another weather event like that. With climate change you can guarantee that is going to happen at some point.What Labour did was follow up on years of planning. There was very careful stewardship there was careful analysis there was data gathering there was legislation that was written up. There was a lot of thought and planning into scale and efficiency—how we could resolve this problem using scale using efficiency using mechanisms such as balance sheet separation that worked—so that we could get an intergenerational solution to the problem. We had Te Mana o te Wai which was explained simply in this House as just putting the importance of water at the centre of the legislation. There is nothing scary about that. We had a management system for stormwater in Auckland. We looked at the special needs of rural communities of farming communities that had invested into some water supplies that had different needs from urban communities. We had a consumer protection system in place which meant there would be inclusion; that people would not be left out and be unable to afford water; that there would be a fair pricing and charging system; that there would be an element of user-pays. This was done through very careful management and what happened last year was an election and there was a cynical racist strategy from the parties on the right—a misinformation campaign. Because there is nothing easier as a way of scaring New Zealanders than to pull out the old race card and start to have a personal vendetta against the Minister who was leading the charge the Hon Nanaia Mahuta. We had thousands of submissions. I sat on the select committee—I had the privilege of chairing the Finance and Expenditure Committee for some of the process—and we had very thoughtful and considered submissions. But we also had thousands and thousands of form submissions basically promoted by the New Zealand Taxpayers' Union. But we listened and on that committee we realised people wanted more local voice. So the system was changed in order to be able to facilitate that local voice. That is what good governance is. Instead what happened is the right got in they had a coalition agreement which said We will agree to repeal this even though we have no idea what we're going to do to replace it."—no idea no plan. "We've got in winning at all costs." which is the strategy that the right has used. Suddenly they realise they've got to do something so what are they going to do? Ram through this repeal bill with no select committee stage. Hon Member: Outrageous.INGRID LEARY: Outrageous after all the years of work that went into it; no select committee stage and no plan and now setting up councils to fail. We've seen it from the Minister. From the moment he met with Tory Whanau from the Greens the Mayor of Wellington to try and show that he was a strong Minister he was going to blame the council already. The writing was on the wall: this Government is setting up councils to fail. We're already seeing the rates response; double digits. That is going to affect pensioners in my electorate it is going to affect first-home buyers it's going to affect ordinary New Zealanders and most of all in my view it's going to affect renters because those costs will be passed on. This is an assault on ordinary people. It's an assault on the vulnerable. It's a shameful day and I am so disappointed in the process this Government is using."