Roche Denise: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Roche Denise: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 15 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6751. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DENISE ROCHE (Green) 
: 
 Nga mihi nui ki a koe me tena koe ki te Whare tenei. 
I would like to start my speech by acknowledging some people in the gallery: Lorna and Barry Stansfield who are my partner’s parents. I am acknowledging them because they are voters they are ratepayers they live in Auckland City and they care about local government. Lorna particularly has been a frequent visitor submitter and petitioner to her local community board and to her council. She is well known by local councillors—some of them fear her. She is very very vocal in saying what she as a ratepayer deserves in her community that should be paid for by her rates. Basically they take advantage of local democracy. Kia ora. 
I also want to acknowledge in this House today those who have represented their communities as representatives on their local councils their local boards their community boards and as mayoral candidates and mayors as well. These are the people who actually signed up to the principles of the Local Government Act 2002. They will have sworn to serve their communities to the best of their abilities and to serve those communities’ interests. Like me they would have been bound by the purposes of the Act. The purposes in the Local Government Act 2002 include the provision for local authorities to play a broad role in promoting the social economic environmental and cultural well-being of their communities taking a sustainable development approach. Those are the four well-beings. This bill the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill seeks to remove the four well-beings from local government. 
The Greens will be voting against this bill because it rips the heart and soul out of the Local Government Act 2002. That was a carefully crafted Act that has stood the test of time. It allowed local communities to determine their own priorities without central government interference. This bill addresses a problem that does not exist and this is backed up by the regulatory impact statement that was provided to the Local Government and Environment Committee. On page 1 it says: “There is limited evidence to inform the development of these proposals”. The regulatory impact statement confirms that this is a rushed job by the Government and that in its haste to carve up local government for its own ends for its own agendas it could well create more mess-ups. Local Government New Zealand agrees that these reforms are based on a beat-up by the Government and it is justifiably disappointed that it was not consulted at all in the drafting of this bill. 
Local Government is right to be worried about this meddlesome bill and the Government’s agenda. Not satisfied with taking the “local” out of local government now the National Government is trying to take the “government” out of local government as well. How else can you describe the provisions in this bill that allow central government the right to intervene in local government or set the financial parameters and benchmarks the proposal to remove citizen participation in council reorganisation proposals—and we have seen that already in Auckland—or the provision around remuneration and employment policy that will deliberately fudge the line between governance and operations and will also eliminate any attempt at good-faith bargaining for local government staff? 
This bill fails to recognise that local government is about locals for locals—locals like Lorna and Barry and the local people whom they democratically elected. This Government not content with dismantling democracy in Canterbury not content with forcing a massive amalgamation in Auckland is set on rolling out a scheme to interfere with and micromanage all the councils in the country. 
This is nanny State behaviour. This is Government acting like a control freak. We will be opposing this bill.