Barker Rick: Local Government (Auckland) Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Barker Rick: Local Government (Auckland) Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Volume:618;Page:13990] 
Hon RICK BARKER (Minister for Courts) 
 on behalf of the 
 Minister of Local Government 
: I move  
That the Local Government (Auckland) Amendment Bill be now read a second time 
. This bill was referred to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. The committee examined the bill thoroughly and has referred it back with majority amendments which have been shown. 
The bill aims to promote increased integration of decision-making processes for integrated Auckland regional transport. It establishes two new council-controlled organisations: the Auckland Regional Transport Authority and Auckland Regional Holdings. The authority will be responsible for the integrated planning funding and development of Auckland’s land transport. The holdings company will own and manage the transport assets and other assets for the Auckland region. Overall the responsibility for the Auckland regional land transport strategy remains with the Auckland Regional Council. 
This is a bill that seeks to make some dramatic improvements to Auckland’s infrastructure and it deals with a past lack of investment. Indeed the Government is now providing an additional $1.62 billion to be spent on Auckland transport over the next 10 years. The bill deals with the necessary changes in the governance structures for Auckland transport and in the way in which transport decision-making is incorporated into wider issues such as land use. The Investing for Growth package and the transport sector review address these funding and governance issues at the national level. Together these proposals consolidate transport governance in the Auckland region and provide a firm foundation for integrated safe responsive and sustainable decision-making. 
Under the bill the Auckland Regional Council will have overarching responsibility for the Auckland regional land transport system. The council will continue to be directly responsible for the regional land transport strategy but will undertake its operations through a new arm’s-length council-controlled organisation: the Auckland Regional Transport Authority. Because of the importance of the authority governance arrangements must be clearly transparent. The board of directors will govern the authority as a council-controlled organisation. The authority will be required to agree to a statement of intent with the council. 
The select committee has added provisions to the bill so that both the council and the authority will be required to provide the reasoning that underlies any proposed change to the authority’s statement of intent. The authority will be responsible for planning funding and developing the Auckland regional land transport system including setting land transport priorities in the region. Consequently the bill precludes the council from including a list of activities or their prioritisation in the regional land transport strategy. The authority will assume responsibility for public transport from the council. 
Auckland’s bids for Transfund funding will be made by the authority through its land transport programme. The authority will also set out a common view on the relative priority of projects across the Auckland network. This will mean that the nine separate land transport programmes for Auckland will be consolidated into just two for the authority and Transit New Zealand. 
The bill will also reduce the number of transport funding decision-makers by disestablishing Infrastructure Auckland and transferring its responsibilities to the Auckland Regional Council. The new council-controlled organisation Auckland Regional Holdings is to take over Infrastructure Auckland’s $1.3 billion asset-management role. Infrastructure Auckland’s liabilities for stormwater grants go to the Auckland Regional Council and for transport grants to the Auckland Regional Transport Authority which is to take over the job of deciding how the funds from those assets are spent. Good governance will again be critical. 
The select committee has made some amendments to further improve the transparency and effectiveness of the governance of Auckland Regional Holdings. Although the council will appoint directors to Auckland Regional Holdings and set the ground rules by which the board may operate it will be able to appoint a maximum of only two council representatives to the board of Auckland Regional Holdings. This provides an appropriate balance between the council’s ability to govern Auckland Regional Holdings and the need to minimise the potential for any future conflict of interest between the directors. As well as having a statement of intent Auckland Regional Holdings will be also required to agree to a long-term funding plan with the Auckland Regional Council. 
The committee has recommended that the bill specify the detail that must be included in Auckland Regional Holdings’ long-term funding plan. This would not include how those funds are used which is a matter for the Auckland Regional Council. Both the council and Auckland Regional Holdings will be required to provide their reasons for any significant proposed changes either to Auckland Regional Holdings’ statement of intent or to the long-term funding plan. The committee has also included new transitional provisions to ensure that Auckland Regional Holdings must prepare its first long-term funding plan as soon as possible but that in the meantime the council can access Auckland Regional Holdings’ funds. This will ensure that the funding for any existing Infrastructure Auckland grants will not be disrupted in the transition. 
The committee has strengthened the safeguards around public ownership of the 80 percent of Ports of Auckland shares currently held by Infrastructure Auckland by maintaining the current restrictions under the Local Government Act 1974. The bill also provides for better alignment between land transport and land-use decision-making by requiring changes to the Auckland Regional Council’s regional policy statement and regional plans and to territorial authorities’ district plans. The bill provides that local authorities will have to prepare and publicly notify changes to their planning documents in order to achieve this alignment. The committee has recommended that the local authorities have an additional month—until 31 March 2005—to do this in light of the local body elections in October and the holiday period over December and January. 
These changes must give effect to the growth concept in the Auckland regional growth strategy. They must also contribute to a range of objectives that the committee has detailed under the new schedule 4A. These objectives include firstly increased certainty in the assessment of resource consents designations and plan changes related to the transport and urban form and secondly facilitating a multimodal transport network and integrated management. The bill provides a streamlined process by which submissions on these planned changes are to be heard by a single joint panel—I am sure that the member Maurice Williamson would support this—and also removes the need for a multiple parallel process. It is also proposed by way of Supplementary Order Paper that the bill facilitate the integration of the Auckland Regional Transport Network Ltd within the new governance arrangements and that the matters that can be included in the regional land transport strategy be further clarified. 
The enactment of this legislation provides a firm basis for improvements in Auckland transport and as someone who lives outside of Auckland I can say that I wholeheartedly endorse this bill and recommend it to the House.