Court SimonSIMON COURT (ACT): Thank you Madam Speaker. The ACT Party won't be supporting this bill the Electoral (Lowering Voting Age for Local Elections and Polls) Legislation Bill. I think what's important to examine is what the basis for this legislation is. What is the problem statement? Because although Parliament is here to pass legislation debate legislation explore it it's always on the basis that there's a problem that's been defined that only legislation can solve. What I haven't heard here today or from the Minister of Local Government is what is the problem this is designed to solve and how it does solve it.Now the Minister has talked about if we can increase representation and if we can encourage younger people to vote then that will increase turnout in local body elections. Well it may well increase the turnout for people aged between 16 and 18 but the Minister doesn't offer any solution as to why so many people have lost confidence in local government that in some places around New Zealand turnout at local government elections is between 30 to 40 percent of electors. The Minister doesn't offer any link between this legislation proposing to increase the suffrage to 16 and 17yearolds and how that will restore confidence in local government although he has made a number of statements in public and in the House at different times that lowering the voting age for local governments to 16 will restore confidence and increase turnout. Well the ACT Party doesn't believe the Minister's assertions and there's actually nothing in this bill that clearly defines the problem statement. There's nothing in the explanatory notes. It simply says what it does as if that explains what the clauses are. What we want to know—what the ACT Party wants to know what people sitting at home want to know—is: what's the problem this is trying to solve? Because the bill does not explain that.We have heard repeatedly that New Zealanders have lost confidence in local government and that has resulted in lower turnouts at elections. There's been concerns that the quality of candidates offering themselves to represent electors at local government level—whether it's at full council or local board or community board—is not sufficient to deal with the complexity of the problems that we face in our communities whether it's about how we respond and adapt to climate change how we fund and finance infrastructure so that more land can be made available for high-density housing so that better public transport services can be offered in a way that meets the needs of communities and groups within communities. None of these problems that local government faces that they are unable to solve either because they don't have the tools or the funding and financing or potentially they don't have representatives elected members with the competencies and the experience to solve these problems—none of that is described in this bill. It's not described in the problem statement; it's certainly not described in the legislation which follows.So why is it that these problems have developed with councils? Well councils haven't delivered for their communities in many cases. Councils have said Look we need more sports fields we need more swimming pools to meet demands that our population growth has put on communities but we don't have the money to do it." But they keep signing consents and more and more people keep coming to live in communities. That's what I personally experienced in West Auckland. We have one swimming pool for 250000 people. When that swimming pool was built for the 1990 Commonwealth Games played in West Auckland there were only 150000 people living in West Auckland. So again community services community facilities have not kept up with population growth. That's one reason why councils are not seen by many communities as actually worthwhile turning out to vote for. Then we have activist policy makers within local government who have taken on the role in many ways that elected members should by insisting for example that if we're going to get more people walking and cycling—rather than making the big calls about where do we build high-quality walking and cycling infrastructure that caters for people at all ages and stages of life what they've done is they've said "Well we just want to run a cycleway through your local town centre which means taking out all the car parks outside small business and we don't care. We'll conduct some average consultation and then we'll take out the car parks and paint cycle lanes on the road and we don't really care what the community thinks." All of these things act to undermine confidence that people have that even turning out to vote for local government is worth their while.And you say "Well how on earth could local government get away with doing this for so long?" Well that's where central government has a role. Central government has been imposing unfunded obligations on to local government in the form of red tape and regulations. All kinds of things like even checking buildings' warrants of fitness. It turns out that when they had the terrible fire in a boarding house in Wellington recently Wellington City Council hadn't even fulfilled its own obligations to check that building's warrant of fitness even though there were people who depended on the safety of that building when they went to sleep at night—to check that the sprinklers worked for example. But Governments imposed these unfunded obligations on to councils whether they should be doing them or not whether they should be funded centrally to do them or not.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Order! Order! I've been listening very carefully to the member's speech and while I appreciate he is traversing matters to do with local government this bill has a slightly different focus and that is the voting arrangements under the Local Electoral Act. In his three minutes 33 seconds I will invite Simon Court to come closer to the bill at hand.SIMON COURT: Thank you Madam Speaker. Always appreciate your guidance and it will be missed when you are no longer a member of Parliament Madam Speaker.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Are you sure though? Are you sure?SIMON COURT: Yes it will definitely be missed. This bill while it lowers the voting age to 16 for local elections and polls doesn't change the age for elected members to an alcohol licensing trust for example or the trustee of the community trust or serving as a juror. So it's unclear why the mandate is extended to only voting in local government elections for 16-year-olds although these other mandates are not. Again it's incoherent legislation that doesn't address a policy problem that itself is not adequately explained.But I do want to offer some hope and encouragement to young people who are not just aged 16 or 17 but potentially even younger who want to become involved in politics. There are plenty of opportunities to join a political party to join a youth wing to become a volunteer to attend debates to support candidates to come here and to learn how the parliamentary process works to make submissions to select committee—as so many young people have when it comes to this bill not just on a matter of electoral franchise but also on other matters that affect young people. Of course there is an election coming up. In just a couple of days Parliament will rise. Many of the MPs here who are seeking re-election will muster teams which include many many young people to go around their electorates standing up hoardings and signs handing out flyers attending all kinds of events and asking people would they give their party vote to the party of their choice. And the ACT Party's not alone. We're also continuing to seek young people to join our youth wing to come along to our events to hear our MPs speak and share policy ideas but most importantly to get questions from young people about matters that affect them.So while ACT won't be supporting this bill we do encourage young people who want to get involved in the political process: you don't have to wait until you're 18; you can join the ACT Party youth wing. You can come along to our debates. We'd be happy to have you in our team. Thank you."