Twyford Phil: Franklin District Council (Contribution to Funding of Museums) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Twyford Phil: Franklin District Council (Contribution to Funding of Museums) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
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PHIL TWYFORD (Labour) 
: 
 I want to pay tribute to the member for Hunua Dr Paul Hutchison who is coming to the end of a fine political career. He was highly regarded by the people in the Hunua district. The member for Hunua stood up—briefly—and articulated the fears and concerns of his constituents. He did it once then he was steamrollered by the National Party. Since then he has been very very quiet about how the people of Hunua feel about the super-city. This bill we are debating tonight the Franklin District Council (Contribution to Funding of Museums) Amendment Bill reflects the concerns and the fears that the people in that member’s electorate have about the way the National-ACT Government has shafted democracy in Auckland. 
If there is one man whom Dr Paul Hutchison has to blame for the impending finale of his political career it is Rodney Hide. Rodney Hide was set up by this Government to do its dirty work. It gave him the job of restructuring Auckland governance because it thought that he would be able to do this very dangerous high-risk job and he would attract all the political flack then when things got out of hand the Prime Minister would be able to shrug and say: “That’s just Rodney Hide not us.” But Rodney Hide’s credibility as the Minister of Local Government who is the Minister responsible for creating the Auckland super-city is so utterly tarnished and damaged not only because of what he has done to Auckland democracy but also because of a list of things as long as your arm that have destroyed the credibility of the Minister of Local Government. I am not going to detail that full list because I think the House and New Zealanders who are listening will know that he is the most damaged man in New Zealand politics. 
The consequence of the damage to Rodney Hide’s credibility has been that the Auckland reforms are completely tarnished in the eyes of Aucklanders and Rodney Hide’s political carcass is hanging around the neck of this Government. The people of Franklin—the people who asked for this bill to be brought to the House—regret it. They regret that they were dragged kicking and screaming by Rodney Hide into the Auckland super-city and the belated and rather modest attempts that Dr Paul Hutchison made to express their concerns did not make the slightest bit of difference. 
The people of Franklin like the people of Rodney and like the people right across the Auckland isthmus are disillusioned and disenchanted and there are plenty of reasons why. It is not just because they were roped into paying a certain amount every year through their rates for institutions like the Museum of Transport and Technology or the Auckland War Memorial Museum which is what this bill initially attempted to deal with; it is because they have lost their democratic voice in local government. Through the setting up of council-controlled organisations by the National-ACT Government 75 percent of local government has been corporatised. [ 
Interruption 
] The member Steven Joyce was responsible for insisting at Cabinet against the advice of Treasury and two other Government departments on corporatising transport and that is the very thing that the people of Franklin resent because it has been imposed on them. He insisted on having an undemocratic corporate model for the Transport Agency which is going to spend more than half the rates of the people of Franklin. What democratic say will they have over his corporate jack-up of a super-city? They will have very little say and that is why the people of Franklin are concerned. 
The other reason they are concerned is that they are worried they will lose their voice and that they will lose the identity of the region of Franklin in this super-city. They have good reason to be afraid because this ACT-National Government has taken away the powers of local communities. It has set up these toothless local boards which have no ability to make by-laws. Steven Joyce’s Transport Agency has the ability to make by-laws and it is run by a bunch of hand-picked corporate directors. For the people of Franklin their local board under this super-city will not even have the ability to make a by-law. They will have to get on their knees and beg the Auckland Council to make a by-law for the region of Franklin. Well how democratic is that? It is no wonder they are ticked off. 
What else are the people of Franklin concerned about? They like the majority of Aucklanders who have said this in recent opinion polls believe that their rates will go up because of the Rodney Hide - John Key super-city and we imagine that they would have good grounds for their concern about that. Rodney Hide has been going around town saying that the user charges will go down under his super-city. The cost of having one’s dog registered under the new Auckland Council will be $70. Well the people of Franklin currently pay $60 to have their dog registered. Rodney Hide is going around boasting that building inspectors will cost $110 an hour in the new Auckland super-city. Well I have news for members. In Franklin I say to Dr Hutchison people pay no more than $112 but it is often as low as $73 for a building inspector. 
Dr Paul Hutchison 
: It’s a great area. 
PHIL TWYFORD 
: Well the member will have to go a long way to convince the people of Franklin that they are getting a good deal under the super-city. 
The other thing that the people of Franklin are concerned about is their water rates. Rodney Hide has gone around for the last couple of weeks saying that— 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: We are a long way away from museums. 
PHIL TWYFORD 
: The people of Franklin are concerned about the costs that they will have to pay under the super-city which is what this bill originally set out to address. It was intended to address the costs that they would pay through their rates for being part of wider Auckland. We know that it is the policy of this Government and of Citizens and Ratepayers the National Party proxy in Auckland to roll out user-pays charges for waste water. That is what people are concerned about. They are worried that their waste-water charges will go through the roof and the people in Franklin are extremely concerned about that. 
We know that recent polls tell us that a solid 50 percent of Aucklanders do not want the super-city. They do not like it; they do not trust it. Well the last poll that was done in Franklin showed that 90 percent of people I say to Dr Hutchison do not want the super-city—90 percent. That is almost twice as much as the number of people in Auckland who do not want it. I think that the member for Hunua will have a very hard job explaining to his electors how he went into bat for them and represented their democratic interests when the next election comes around. 
The other issue that really grates on people in Franklin is not only the fact that the people on the Waikato side of the old boundary had to pay a share of the contribution to the museums but also those people care about their publicly owned assets like the Ports of Auckland and they care about vital infrastructure. This Government is obviously setting up those assets to be privatised and we saw that when the third super-city bill removed the democratic right that Aucklanders have to approve it in a referendum before the Ports of Auckland can be sold off. Well this Government legislated that right away because it does not care about people having the right to make a decision about whether their assets are privatised. That is why in the local body elections that are currently going on the people of Franklin are expressing their concern. They want to vote for candidates who will save the assets from privatisation and will not flog them off to overseas owners. 
We have recently seen the kind of shonky behind-the-scenes decision-making that Aucklanders and the people of Franklin have come to fear with this super-city. We have seen this Government putting in a new computer system for the Auckland super-city which is costing $62 million and which the Government did not put out to tender. This is exactly the kind of concern that the people of Franklin have about the way their rates are being spent. It is what motivated them to ask for this bill to be brought to the House and what do we see? We see shonky mates’ rates behaviour from the hand-picked mates of National who have been put in place to run the new Auckland Council. What did they do? They let a contract for computers for $62 million without putting it out for tender. I predict that this is the kind of behaviour we will see more of. It is exactly what the people of Franklin feared. All the way along it is not only the fact that the people of Franklin have been forced to pay for these museum levies but also the people of Franklin like the people of wider Auckland were never given a say on the super-city. They were never given any choice they were not listened to and they were treated with contempt by this Government.