Kuriger BarbaraBARBARA KURIGER (National—Taranaki-King Country): Thank you Mr Speaker. I want to acknowledge Glen Bennett for shepherding this bill to the House. I also want to make a point on some of the previous points that Mr Bennett just made that Taranaki is a very parochial place and it's partly because I think we had so many boundaries that were hard to get out of for a number of years we just joined together and did what we needed to do. I have to say on the sunshine hours' one it's a pride thing to have but I have felt in terms of the last few months of this year very lucky to be based on the west coast of the North Island of New Zealand because I realise that people north and east of us have been suffering tremendously.I will just make note that when we're talking about assets in Taranaki David Bennett—the other Mr Bennett in the House at the moment—just brought to my attention to remind people that Taranaki is now part of the Chiefs and I look forward to the game at the newly reformed stadium which has actually been having earthquake strengthening for the last few years. So when we talk about things that the New Plymouth District Council is able to achieve along with the Taranaki Regional Council that's one of those assets.So National supports the intent of the bill to ensure sustainable long-term revenue for the people of New Plymouth. It's a small bill. It will place reasonable statutory direction and control of the fund ensuring it remains sustainable and delivers benefit for ratepayers. It has been endorsed by the council. I would also like to make mention of Mayor Neil Holdom and his council in New Plymouth and also declare that I'm a ratepayer of that council as well. So in speaking to this bill I just want to make that very clear.I wasn't part of the Governance and Administration Committee but I do know that this piece of legislation has undergone the full select committee process and we will continue to support this bill.So the object of the bill which is to provide financial sustainability to the New Plymouth District is aligned with National's vision for a local government of devolved power and councils maintaining diverse and sustainable revenue streams to deliver for their ratepayers. While there are no current plans for amalgamation the New Plymouth District Council have expressed a desire to ring-fence this fund for their own ratepayers. I will talk a little bit more about that in terms of submissions shortly. But it wants a sustainable revenue stream to deliver for the ratepayers. I guess when I think about that from a wider perspective and some of the legislation that's being put forward over recent times around various entities in other bills such as the water bills and things we do actually have to think about what our councils are going to look like in the future. We support our councils to make those decisions but this is a protection if you put all of that in the context of what we've recently been experiencing.The people of New Plymouth own the shares that they sold to create this fund and they should be able to reap the benefits of that. But what I will say is that it is designed to be a scheme that will benefit the whole community.It would be remiss of me to not talk about one submitter's concerns because I think they need to be put on the table. One submitter opposed the provision of the bill which would limit the benefits of the fund to the current district boundaries because he felt that it may cause disparities amongst ratepayers. That's a fair question. I commend the committee for giving a fair hearing to the submitter. He had proposed amendment of that provision to account for future changes to the district area. I think that question actually is a good one for those who distribute the funds just to keep in mind in the future in terms of what they're doing—is it going to benefit ratepayers? I think the point in time when it would benefit ratepayers is when the fund went into a deep hole or if the council needed some extra funding and they had to dip into the fund to actually support what goes on in the community in the future. But hopefully with proven investment that won't happen and they won't have to dip into that fund to fund basic requirements and they'll be able to use it to expand on what's going on in the community.The New Plymouth District Council established this fund in 2004 and it was to operate as a sustainable perpetual fund. This means that the money released from the fund should be lower than its earnings so that the fund's capital base remains the same or grows. The opening balance was $259 million but during the 2008 global financial crisis the fund lost around $113 million in value over a five-year period. To recover this loss the New Plymouth District Council reduced releases and increased rates. This bill aims to prevent those sort of issues from happening in the future. Although the fund has recovered since the global financial crisis the bill does aim to prevent that and Part 2 of the bill addresses just how the fund would be managed. Good management of this fund should ensure that it continues to be an alternative source of revenue and it can subsidise rates in the New Plymouth District.It also says that the fund would be managed and used for the social economic environmental and cultural wellbeing of the New Plymouth communities. I believe that the concern that the submitter brought to the committee—this was the worry of that person. I think it's clearly listed in the documentation that that is the intent and we hope that the investments go well in the future to allow that to happen. But it still does as part of this piece of legislation allow the fund to be tapped into if there is a genuine crisis. We all know we've seen a few of those over the last while. If they've not been pandemics they've been cyclones; we've seen cities recovering from earthquakes. Who knows what we're going to be facing in the future. So touch wood that things will progress well for New Plymouth but one never knows so it's always good to have a bit of a nest egg in place just in case.So clause 4 of the bill does define the New Plymouth District" as the area delineated in section 35 of the Local Government (Taranaki Region) Reorganisation Order 1989. When I think about 1989 it reminds me of one of my areas in my electorate: Whangamomona. I represent the only republic in New Zealand. There was a bit of a concern about the reallocation of those boundaries and so Whangamomona now has its own mayor in a fun sense and has a republic day every two years. But it sent a clear message in 1989 and every couple of years that republic still continues to send that clear message.The bill would restrict spending from this fund to the district area. So that is clearly defined in the Act. It does not provide the flexibility to account for potential future change to these boundaries. The committee said "We asked whether such changes would create any difficulties if the bill were passed. [And] New Plymouth District Council told us that it has previously dealt with geographically limited funds and is confident that it can manage [this] in an effective way." So in supporting this local bill as part of the National Party and as a Taranaki person I want to commend this bill to the House and thank the select committee for the work that they did. Thank you."