Williams Andrew: General Debate 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Williams Andrew: General Debate 
[Sitting date: 18 July 2012. Volume:681;Page:3641. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
ANDREW WILLIAMS (NZ First) 
: 
 I seek leave of the House to table a copy of a speech by Lawrence Yule the president of Local Government New Zealand to the conference on Monday 16 July. 
Mr SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is objection. 
ANDREW WILLIAMS 
: Well is that not interesting. If the Government does not want to receive a copy of the speech by the president of Local Government New Zealand then I will have to refer to it. I am not surprised that the Government would not want to have a copy of that speech in the Parliament today because the president Lawrence Yule in the presence of the Minister of Local Government and in the presence of the Prime Minister basically said that this Government in many respects to local government had it wrong—had it wrong. So I will refer to some of the things. The president Yule said: “Local Government New Zealand does have some concerns with the Government’s Better Local Government reform agenda. … LGNZ questions the proposal to refocus the purpose of local government in the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill 2012 with the removal of the four wellbeings. We believe this fundamentally undermines the integrity of the relationship the local authorities have with their communities. Part of the purpose of the current Act ensures outcomes must be delivered to communities. If one of the reasons for the changes is to limit the role of local government then we question this approach.” 
It is interesting that this Government has made out that it has buy-in from local government in terms of the reforms of the Local Government Act. The Minister of Local Government David Carter on  
Q+A 
 on 20 May said: “I’ve spent a lot of time talking to local government people right around New Zealand over the last six weeks and frankly most”—and this is the word—“local government politicians are very supportive of these reforms. At the moment they get caught with requests from their ratepayers for them to be involved in all sorts of projects which are often difficult to turn down because of the very wide purpose statement in the act passed in 2002. So local government people tend to want these reforms.”  
Well is it not interesting that this week 78 councils attended the local government conference in Queenstown. It was held in Queenstown because it was going to be held in Christchurch but because of the earthquake it had to be transferred to Queenstown. Some people have criticised local government for having it there but it was as a result from having to move it from Christchurch. But it is interesting that all 78 councils unanimously voted that they wanted the Government to rethink its attitude towards the review of the local government bill.  
 So is it not interesting that the Minister can go on New Zealand public television—we do not have public television any more; the closest to it is Television New Zealand—on  
Q+A 
 and say that he has got buy-in from all around New Zealand from local government on this. Also Nicky Wagner the chairperson of the Local Government and Environment Committee which is considering this bill and I am on that same committee said on 12 June in this House: “local government Ministers”—and she was referring to the former Minister Nick Smith and the current one David Carter—“have met with Local Government New Zealand mayors right across the country regional council chairs regional chief executive officers and numerous ratepayer groups in order to understand the issues and to formulate these amendments.” Well is it not interesting that on one hand we are being told by both the Minister and the chairperson of the Local Government and Environment Committee that they have widely consulted and they have buy-in from local government and that this is supported by local government yet here is a media release from the president of Local Government New Zealand following the conference saying that 78 councils voted unanimously that this needed to be rethought by this Government.  
This is another case of this Government not being in touch with what is happening out there in reality. It is another case of the Government being very economic with the truth and making out that it has widely consulted making out that it has buy-in on this and making out that it has support for this but around New Zealand there are councils there are communities and there are many many organisations that are very dependent on the support of their local authorities—they are very dependent on the cooperation of their local authorities for their communities—which are greatly greatly concerned at what is proposed in the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill. I sit on that select committee and we will certainly be asking the hard questions of this Government. Is this just another one of its Dr Seuss - type fantasies? Has this been dreamt up from one of its  
Fantasy Island 
 books—that it wants to have these radical reforms of local government? Or is it just another case of the Government using excuses to move in on local government to centralise power to Wellington to have an autocracy and a— 
The debate having concluded the motion lapsed.