SpeechANGELA ROBERTS (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. I hopefully rise to take a call on this bill and I will join my colleagues in congratulating Mr Bennett in his ability to shepherd the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill through the House.It's wonderful to hear everybody across the House struggling to be the one who has the closest connection with New Plymouth but I've been a ratepayer there for a very long time and I remember when those Powerco shares got sold. It was really controversial at the time because funnily enough people were concerned that the fund might not make any money.Sadly in about 2013 when there was a massive drought in Tasmania and the farms that we invested in there—Mr McKelvie did point out there seemed to be some slight irony when you're coming from the middle of dairy country. There was a massive drought in Australia and there was also the global financial crisis and millions and millions of dollars fell out of that fund.Alongside that as we've also heard the council realised the intention of that fund which was to supplement the pressure on rates increases. So that ate away at the fund as well. That was problematic and those genuine concerns—it was interesting because when we talked about Powerco that was our local power company and there were two reasons why people were concerned. One was—it's a long time ago now but it's interesting to reflect on the concerns as they were on the day—that the community owning those assets and having a steady return on investment that comes with owning a power company versus the risk of buying I don't know a dairy farm in Tasmania.But the other important idea about community involvement in that decision making and the concerns quite rightly about the council's ability to manage those funds. There was a lot of I told you so" nearly 10 years later when some of those risks and some of those concerns bore fruit. So it is really good to see those lessons being learnt and the council taking its job very very seriously and taking a long time to consult with the community consider all of those alternatives to come up with what they believed was the best way forward.Of course there's two main aspects to the legislation. One is about how the fund is managed and how it is applied and the second part being about the independent financial management. One of the wonderful things about the piece of legislation in clause 7: it talks about how it is applied and the idea that the Perpetual Investment Fund (PIF) will be managed and used for the social economic environmental and cultural wellbeing of New Plymouth communities is a wonderful sentence to read out.We've just had a conversation in the dinner break actually about our world-leading living standards framework and the idea that while the critical thing—we need to have income in order to invest in our communities whether that be rates or the return on our Perpetual Investment Fund—we need that cash absolutely. But what we do with it is so important. For me this is the highlight of this piece of legislation: the fact that they will be required—those independent financial managers aren't just looking at the stock numbers going up and down and what the return is on investment; it's actually what we do as a community to invest in all of our community in the New Plymouth District. That's really really exciting to me.How do we make sure that it isn't just about rates reduction but about taking those wonderful opportunities to invest in all aspects of our community for our wellbeing? We talk about growth and we've often talked about growth being about GDP but actually growth of our communities involves their wellbeing. I'm really really pleased to see this and I think this goes to prove yet again how ground-breaking the New Plymouth District is and the Taranaki region is at really leaning into those just transition challenges. I think this is another really good example of how the legislation they put forward is really really progressive.Then the other thing of course is that independence. We know that the mayors at the time when there were challenges about "Should we be selling up those dairy farms? Should we be hanging in there?" and at the very least a distraction from their core business which was about focusing on what they did with the return on that investment.So I will acknowledge—a lot of people have acknowledged—one of the biggest challenges that came through from the community was around the implications of potential boundary changes. That submission came from people who live on the boundary the New Plymouth District. The boundaries to the North are in a wonderful part of the country Tongapōrutu and Mokau on that beautiful west coast. I guess the community there straddles a couple of iwi—it's a pretty competitive patch actually—and they also straddle a couple of districts. So they're very aware of the significant changes that can happen when you are potentially popped into another district and another district's ratings or the return on the PIF. And I think that was a really really valid question to ask.Everyone's assuming that the potential situation where that may have come up would be if there was a consolidation of those three mighty councils in Taranaki into one super-mighty council in Taranaki. But of course there are simply boundary shifts that can happen as well. So whether a council got bigger—so the decision a council then has to make about which constituents in that council miss out on the fund—or what happens if the council boundaries shrink and now you've got people who technically sit outside that council who will continue to actually have that investment that they've made over the generations being protected.It is a really valid concern and the council have told us that they've previously managed—dealt with—geographically limited funds and maybe what it does is it means that what happens to those funds is really invested in a way that isn't a very short-term "let's do a rates rebate" because that's really difficult. You know my rates are different from your rates because you live on this side of the old council boundaries. But maybe it is that they are encouraged and incentivised to invest in things that will actually benefit everybody in the council.But maybe there's a bit of a flow-on effect. There are people outside of the New Plymouth District Council who benefit in an investment. We've heard today: WOMAD the Festival of Lights and all sorts of other aspects. Our libraries our swimming pools get enjoyed by people who aren't technically ratepayers or technically those who've contributed to the Perpetual Investment Fund. So I really like the potential that this legislation frames up. Most people look at these pieces of legislation and they think about triple A ratings which are important but I like to look at the potential of humanity being involved in the decision making around here.I note this is a local bill as opposed to a member's bill and it's really great that our wonderful friend Mr Glen Bennett has been able to shepherd it through the House. Like I say I was there when those Powerco shares were first sold and those investments and those hard lessons have been learnt by our community. It's really great to see that the council has been honest and forthright and frankly confronted the shortcomings that came with the original way that that fund was managed and the challenges that presented. I think they have been really courageous in being honest about what they needed to do to improve things.So it makes me pretty happy as a ratepayer actually to be standing here and supporting the PIF and the significant financial asset being protected and enhanced and making sure that not just me as a ratepayer but my mother my mother-in-law and my children are all going to benefit—and their children. And it is for that reason that I'm really happy to commend this bill to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Poto Williams): I believe this is a split call. The Hon David Bennett—five minutes."