Twyford Phil: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
Twyford Phil: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
[Volume:661;Page:9964] 
PHIL TWYFORD (Labour) 
: 
 This time last year by ramming legislation through the House under urgency this National Government staged a coup against democracy in Auckland. This National Government bypassed Aucklanders’ right to a referendum under the Local Government Act and that Minister sitting over there Rodney Hide embarked on the most cynical undermining of democracy this country has seen in many a year. Aucklanders thought that that was bad and they were right. People all around the country have been wondering who is next for the chop. 
Today the people of Canterbury have experienced an even more barefaced outrage: the abrogation of their district council and the sacking of their elected representatives. I want to read a quote: “Elections are central to democracy but they are not always on their own a magic or quick-fix solution.” I invite members of this House to guess who said those words. Could it be Nick Smith maybe? Wyatt Creech? Nicky Wagner? Amy Adams? Could it even be Rodney Hide? Actually it was Frank Bainimarama in 2008. Elections will not be held for Environment Canterbury until 2013 perhaps slightly before Commodore Bainimarama plans to hold elections in Fiji but not much before. I say welcome to Fiji on the Rakaia. 
This Government has form when it comes to riding roughshod over our nation’s democratic traditions. That is what is happening here tonight in this House as the elected representatives of the people of Canterbury are sacked by Nick Smith and Rodney Hide. They have done it before in Auckland. They bypassed Aucklanders’ right to a referendum on forced amalgamation they stole the democratic rights of local communities in Auckland they rammed through changes in this House under urgency and there has been a rushed and inadequate consultation process. In all of that process over the last year at least they made a pathetic attempt to listen to Aucklanders even though it was mostly a fake listening campaign. It is no wonder Aucklanders feel ignored and 56 percent of them told the  
New Zealand Herald 
 the other day that they do not want to be part of a super-city. 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: Did they have a select committee in Auckland? 
PHIL TWYFORD 
: They had a select committee in Auckland but they are not having a select committee for this bill. They do not even think the people of Canterbury deserve the courtesy of a select committee process. This outrage shows a total disdain for the democratic rights of the people of Canterbury. For this National Government and its cronies democracy is an inconvenience. It is an irritation. When democracy gets in the way of National’s objectives and agenda it is given the chop. 
Environment Canterbury has had a very difficult time dealing with the tensions associated with water allocations. No one has come down to the House tonight and suggested that Environment Canterbury has done a good job. No one is suggesting that. It has had problems but the response of this Government is to take it out to the back of the wood shed and dispatch it with a blow to the head. Fourteen councillors are getting the chop and with them go the democratic rights of the people of Canterbury. 
For the next 3½ years the people of Canterbury will have no say and no input and there will be no accountability for the actions that Rodney Hide and Nick Smith’s appointees will make on their behalf. That is the way Nick Smith and Rodney Hide like it. This National Government is so divorced from our country’s traditions and democratic institutions and cares so little that it is not even embarrassed in the slightest by what it is doing tonight. It has no conscience and no embarrassment about abrogating the democratic rights of the people of Canterbury simply because Environment Canterbury is not doing its bidding and is struggling to come to terms with one of the most difficult environment and development issues this country faces. For this National Government that is enough justification to take Environment Canterbury out the back and knock it on the head. 
One would think that this Government would have thought twice before doing this given the bath it is taking in Auckland. Anger resentment mistrust and anxiety about our democratic institutions are being expressed from Pukekohe to Wellsford by Aucklanders of all political persuasions. They do not like what this Government is doing. They do not like the fact that Rodney Hide whose party earned 3.65 percent of the vote in the last election is running local government policy and undertaking one of the most damaging initiatives that local government has seen in this country’s history. People understand what is going on. They are not silly. They understand that this Government is taking away the rights of local communities to have a say and is handing those rights and that power to Nick Smith’s and Rodney Hide’s hand-picked appointees. They do not like it. 
This National Government has a very retro approach to democracy. It is taking us back to the future. This is not democracy in the 21st century. The National Government is taking us back to oligarchy and the days of the 19th century. That is the kind of politics it is comfortable with. It is so much more efficient to have the great and the good sitting around the boardroom table making decisions on behalf of everybody else. It is so much more efficient. It is so much tidier to have the boardroom in control instead of the ballot box. That is the way Rodney Hide likes it. It is not a lot different from Rodney Hide’s and Steven Joyce’s so-called council-controlled organisations which will be in charge of 75 percent of the assets income and expenditure of the Auckland Council if they have their way and continue with their agenda of corporatising Auckland local government and handing over that city’s resources and assets to their hand-picked mates. I ask members to consider the cavalier disregard for our democratic institutions the speed with which this Government is willing to throw them out the window and install its own hand-picked appointees to run our institutions and the whiff of oligarchy that hangs over this disgraceful legislation. Members should make no mistake: this Government is a threat to our democracy. 
For 3½ years the people of Canterbury will have no representation. They will continue to pay rates but they will have no say and no input into how the commissioners deal with their resources and their environment. Rodney Hide and Nick Smith are going to take over because they think they know better. They will hand-pick the decision makers and try to get them to ram through their agenda. National does not trust the people. It is only a few months until the local elections. This Government does not trust the people of Canterbury to look at the situation make an informed judgment and democratically elect their representatives to take office and sort the situation out. The people know there is a problem. They know things need to change but this Government does not trust them. 
Oligarchy and cronyism go together. We have seen it in Auckland. We saw the former National Party president Michelle Boag advising John Banks’ mayoral campaign and hired by Rodney Hide’s Auckland Transition Agency to recruit senior executives for the super-city. For an entire week Rodney Hide Mark Ford Michelle Boag and John Banks all denied that there was a conflict of interest. They do not really see things that way. They do not see that it is a conflict of interest to have their cronies making decisions on their behalf. Rodney Hide and Steven Joyce are appointing the directors of the council-controlled organisations.