Simpson Scott: Arts Centre of Christchurch Trust Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSimpson Scott: Arts Centre of Christchurch Trust Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 01 April 2015. Volume:704;Page:2818. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): It is a delight to stand in support of the second reading of this Arts Centre of Christchurch Trust Bill. As chairman of the Local Government and Environment Committee which considered the bill I got a sense as listeners and people observing in the gallery will have had from the two previous Christchurch-based members who have spoken on the bill about the sense of passion the sense of commitment the sense of history and the sense of ownership of these buildings that make up this remarkable Christchurch Arts Centre.I am not a Cantabrian I am not a person who has spent an awful lot of time in my life in Christchurch but every time I visited Christchurch I have been much aware of the Arts Centre being there. In fact I can remember 20 or more years ago visiting the Arts Centre for the first time and being completely overwhelmed by the design the history and the sense of presence of the buildings. So when the devastating earthquakes of 2010 and 2011 hit the Canterbury region in such a devastating way it was a shock to all New Zealanders that the site of the Arts Centre should be so badly damaged in the way that it was. I think Megan Woods mentioned that there are 24 individual buildings that make up the Christchurch Arts Centre and that 23 of those 24 buildings were significantly and seriously damaged.In the course of the select committee’s work on this bill the committee was privileged to actually visit Christchurch and to hear the four submitters in Christchurch who wanted to have their views made known to the committee. As a result of that once we had finished hearing from submitters we took an opportunity to conduct a site visit. The site visit was extremely useful and worthwhile. I think members would be truly impressed if they have the opportunity to go and visit what is regarded as the largest heritage restoration project in the world currently under way taking place in Christchurch right now. It is a 7-year project. It is well under way. There are craftsmen and stonemasons from around the world using traditional stonemasonry methods for the repair and rejuvenation and rebuild of those heritage buildings using techniques that have probably not been used in New Zealand for maybe 40 50 or 60 years or even longer than that. These are truly unique buildings.I was delighted to hear Megan Woods give the very full history of the site. I was interested also to note that not one of the submitters mentioned Norman Kirk once. However it is clear from her recitation that he was the primary driver in the creation of the Arts Centre—not wanting to take anything away from other members of the Canterbury community who over the years have contributed to its success and its ongoing enduring place in the hearts of all Canterbury people and indeed probably all New Zealanders who have had an association with it. It is no doubt that the buildings hold a very special place in the hearts of Cantabrians Christchurch people and indeed many New Zealanders.So it is important—as the trust chair Jen Crawford and the chief executive André Lovatt made clear when they made their submission to the committee—that the governance for the Arts Centre structure going forward should be a governance structure that reflects adequately the circumstances that the trust finds itself in today 40 or more years after the trust was first constituted and 40 or more years since the University of Canterbury exited the site. Now the trust finds itself with a massive restoration project under way—a project that is going to take a number of years to complete—and it needs an appropriate modern up-to-date and relevant skills-based governance structure in order to see that project through to fruition and to completion. Secondly once that project is complete in about another 6 years’ time the trust is going to need a governance structure that will ensure the ongoing conservation and usefulness of the site for Cantabrians and for other visitors. To do that the governance structure that was set in place originally needed modernising and that is really the purpose of this legislation.This is a bill that has been sponsored by my colleague the Hon Nicky Wagner as the member of Parliament for Christchurch Central but it is being promoted by the Arts Centre of Christchurch Trust Board itself. For the trust to actually have the foresight and wisdom and confidence to bring promote and encourage a bill like this gives the House an indication of the calibre of the current trustees and their recognition that they do have to be forward-looking and that they do have to look to the future and not just to the past because as with any heritage site it is the future that is just as relevant as the past in terms of its care and preservation.I am delighted that one of the recommendations that the select committee made was that conservation plans should become part of the annual meeting structure and agenda. Each year members of the trust and other associated people who have an interest in the Arts Centre will be able to get a sense of what the trust is doing in terms of preservation and conservation and they will be able to have—as they should do as stakeholders of that city and that site—an opportunity to participate and be very much part of that. I want to just quote if I may from the submission from the Arts Centre itself because I think it neatly sums up the objectives of this bill. The objectives of the trust had previously been separated from the powers of the trust and so this bill changes that. It makes it such that the provisions will truly reflect the trust’s charitable intent and in a way that was not previously the case. So those two provisions—which are actually quite technical and on the face of them quite minor—have a fundamental impact on the ongoing governance management and benefit of the whole Arts Centre complex.There were a number of other changes that the select committee made and I think it is worth noting that the select committee process for this bill was a classic example of a select committee working collaboratively collegially and in a cross-partisan way to ensure that the legislation that was presented to us at the first reading actually came out through the select committee process as a better piece of legislation. I am very pleased to acknowledge that the Hon Nicky Wagner has identified that and I think all members of the committee would agree that the process was very good the intentions were well-meaning and well-made and the submitters—all four of them—were generally in support of the proposed legislative changes. We have made a number of changes. I am not going to go through them all but they will essentially mean that the Arts Centre is able to be far more modern in its outlook than it has been in the past. The legal foundations of the new governance structure will provide a platform and stability for future trust members and governance officers of the trust to ensure that the very significant parts of the history of this site are maintained and protected.The centre is one of the largest clusters of heritage buildings in the country. We are a young nation with not much in the way of longstanding historic buildings. The nature of our architecture is largely wooden and timber-based and so a lot of that stone-based work that was so prevalent and common in the English tradition was not seen in New Zealand. The Arts Centre in Christchurch actually provides a classic and wonderful example of what at the time was considered to be a mock little Britain and provides a university environment similar to that experienced at Cambridge and Oxford. Members who take the time to travel to the Arts Centre and have a look at it would immediately see that the areas where Lord Ernest Rutherford did his significant work were instrumental in the creation of the site. One of the interesting things that we discovered in our visit was that a whole lot of history had been uncovered as a result of the restoration work and so I was delighted to see some of that.This is a bill that is a good bill; it is a bill that the House will hopefully endorse unanimously across the Chamber. It is deserving of that kind of support because it is a significant piece of governance structure that will mean the Arts Centre will be able to be governed in a way that is meaningful proper and solid going forward. I commend the bill to the House.