King Annette: South Taranaki District Council (Cold Creek Rural Water Supply) Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
King Annette: South Taranaki District Council (Cold Creek Rural Water Supply) Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Sitting date: 20 February 2013. Volume:687;Page:8057. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon ANNETTE KING (Labour—Rongotai) 
: 
 Labour does support this bill the South Taranaki District Council (Cold Creek Rural Water Supply) Bill although we are going to support Supplementary Order Paper 179 put forward by Andrew Williams. We have thought long and hard about supporting the Supplementary Order Paper but we believe that it will probably help to resolve some of the anxiety that local people may well have over this bill. His Supplementary Order Paper does require a referendum on the Cold Creek rural water supply to be open to all eligible residents and ratepayers on the South Taranaki District electoral roll. The reason why we will support that Mr Williams is the impact that this scheme has on the people of Opunake. Although they are not regular users of this scheme because this scheme is for the purpose of about 162 connections covering 7620 hectares in South Taranaki it is also used in emergency situations for water supply into Opunake. I know that they—[ 
Interruption 
] No we were assured at the Local Government and Environment Committee that in terms of an emergency they would still have access to it. Am I taking it from the Minister for Courts who is shaking his head and saying “Not any more.”—I mean because the question was asked Minister at the select committee “Would they continue to have access to the water supply for Opunake in emergency situations?” and the answer was “Yes.” Is that the Minister’s understanding? 
Hon Chester Borrows 
: Yes. 
Hon ANNETTE KING 
: Fine. I thought the Minister was disputing my comments then. That is why Minister—and I think you would see the sense of that—you would enable the people of South Taranaki on the electoral roll to participate in a referendum. That seems fair to us and I cannot see why that would be objected to. 
You see this bill is trying to resolve an issue. I think the key word in this bill is that it establishes a “process”—“a process by which the council may obtain the authority to transfer the Cold Creek Rural Water Supply Scheme to Cold Creek Community Water Supply Limited.” The purpose as we have heard is primarily for farming. It has been managed by the company since 2001. It has been an informal arrangement and that informal arrangement has been deemed unsatisfactory. So I can see why the council wants to tidy it up and put in place a process over which it would be able to transfer this to those who use the scheme. 
We looked carefully at the bill. We listened carefully to the submissions and we know that there was concern particularly from the iwi of the area around consultation but at the end of the day it seemed to be a logical conclusion to what has been a long-running issue. But Mr Borrows we would suggest and recommend to you that you accept the Supplementary Order Paper from Andrew Williams. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.