Roche Denise: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Roche Denise: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 27 November 2012. Volume:686;Page:6803. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DENISE ROCHE (Green) 
: 
 The purpose of the Local Government Act and the changes that are being promoted by this Government are nothing less than evil essentially. It is. Removing the four well-beings—environmental economic social and cultural well-being of communities—is nothing short of nasty. This Government does not like local government. The premise for the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill is a beat-up and we have heard this from other speakers. We have heard it in the evidence from Local Government New Zealand. We have heard it from the regulatory impact statement as well which says that there is no evidence to suggest that local authorities are acting imprudently. The regulatory impact statement also says that this is a rushed job. I think we all know that we can follow the slogan that they use for reminding drivers to slow down: “The faster you go the bigger the mess.” That is what will happen if we allow this bill to go through. This is a solution that is looking for a problem. In fact this is a solution that will create problems. 
This bill punishes local government and it allows the National Government to meddle and interfere in local government. Why would that happen? Why would you allow for the carve-up of assets and services? Why would you allow for communities to disband what they have set up over many many years which is accountable transparent democratic local representation? I want to pay tribute to the members of this House who have been active in local government. I particularly want to acknowledge Tracey Martin from New Zealand First who is a current serving member of the Rodney Local Board as well as being a New Zealand First list MP. She spoke very eloquently about what it was like to go through a forced amalgamation. I was one of those representatives who was also representing my community as a local board member and prior to that as an Auckland city councillor when we were forced and rushed into an undemocratic process that amalgamated the councils in the Auckland region. During that time I can assure you that there was a hue and outcry about the fact that the National Government was stealing from us as ratepayers was stealing our democracy. 
Local government ain’t broke in New Zealand and there is no need to fix it. Local government does democracy well. It does it much better than this House does. There are annual plans there are long-term council community plans there are by-laws there are other plans like waste management plans and there are the unitary plans. They all have submission processes. They all have processes where citizens are actively engaged and feed into the process. They participate. This bill destroys that participation. This bill will destroy democracy. When you reduce participation that is what you do; you destroy democracy. The reorganisation proposals in this bill and these amendments even the ones that have been put forward by the Government do not go anywhere near restoring any type of democracy. Having been through an anti-democratic process I certainly do not want to see this rolled out to other councils throughout New Zealand. So we will be supporting Supplementary Order Paper 159 by Eugenie Sage to restore the democracy and the reorganisation proposals in Part 1 of this bill. 
The Government’s intention for this bill is clearly stated in the commentary that accompanied this bill into its second reading into the House where it says: “The bill also seeks to establish a more flexible range of mechanisms for Crown assistance and intervention in the affairs of individual councils with the aim of providing assistance to councils before situations become critical.”