Watts Simon; McAnulty KieranSIMON WATTS (National—North Shore): Thank you very much. As the Minister outlined in his reply to one of the questions the reference there to the future of local government review my question is in regards to that review which was undertaken during the period in which we are reviewing this afternoon: why has that subsequently been thrown to another in effect review committee to work out what needs to be done and in effect kicked for touch to April—give or take—of next year when actually a large number of the issues within the local Government sector are well known and 90 percent of the issues primarily relate to funding finance and the financial sustainability of that sector? So why is the Minister choosing to continue to kick that issue down the road and not take some accountability in regards to being clear and concise around how the Government is planning to deal with the financial sustainability issues that the local government sector is facing?Also in regards to that future of local government review there were a wide-ranging number of recommendations many of which in our view are not necessarily relevant or make the boat go faster in regards to making the local government sector high quality nor financially sustainable. I'd be interested in the Minister's view around what aspects of that review he does not support to save a little bit of time and effort by those individuals from further considering those points and coming up with further recommendations which will not be implemented by any Government in the future.Hon KIERAN McANULTY (Minister of Local Government): The member might be happy to pick and choose which ones he and his party support and then go to the sector and say This is what we think; what do you think?" We're not going to take that approach. We've said to the sector "Here's an opportunity." We don't want to repeat the mistakes of the past and numerous reviews over successive Governments that have taken the approach that he's proposing. We've said "Sit down together try to find a consensus view on the recommendations."—a view that takes into account rural metro provincial and regional/unitary authorities and how it worked for them. Then after the election I have invited them to sit down and we will work through it together. That has had a really positive response and I stand by that. If we're going to find a solution that works for the sector we've got to work alongside them and as long as I'm Minister that'll be my commitment to them.SIMON WATTS (National—North Shore): One of the major issues facing the local government sector in addition to the issues around financial sustainability funding and finance relate to workforce. From the Minister I'm interested in what plans or actions the Minister has considered or is the Minister considering in regards to providing relief to the local government sector in terms of the significant workforce challenges that that sector has been under under the review in which we are undertaking during that period and continues to be impacted by. In particular a number of examples in regards to workforce vacancies which are related to the appropriation and the fact that the local government sector has the inability to fill those vacancies because a number of those technical experts have in effect been—and I'm using some language from a number of those within the local government sector—"poached" by central Government agencies on salaries sometimes 30 to 40 percent higher for the same or similar role within local government. So I'm interested in regards to aspects around particularly retention of those individuals within the sector and what the Minister is planning to do in order to provide a degree of certainty for those individuals who obviously undertake significantly important roles across our local government sector and in effect provide a number of solutions and options and value for our local communities. And I think that was highlighted again by the response of our local government sector during the period of the natural disasters that we faced earlier this year.It is without doubt that without the support of and the role of and the actions by members of our local government sector we would not have seen our communities be able to respond nor our communities be able to rebuild from the implications of what has occurred in that regard. But the reality is that a number of people within the local government sector because of those significant workforce shortages and issues around changing reform policy means that they are leaving the sector and yet we don't seem to have a clear plan in regards to the workforce and the keeping and the building of capability and competence within that sector which is a critical sector for our community.So I'm interested in the Minister's views around that and what specific actions if any have been undertaken in regards to mitigate that risk. Hon KIERAN McANULTY (Minister of Local Government): In so far as that is relevant to the Estimates I will give an example that will assist councils considerably and that is water reform because what the Government is doing will remove a significant amount of debt from council's books debts that they are currently having to service; that is a significant financial burden on local communities. The member's party has put forward a proposal that will not remove debt from their books and they will continue to have to service that individually at rates that will ultimately become unaffordable for ratepayers."