Tirikatene RinoRINO TIRIKATENE (Labour—Te Tai Tonga): Tēnā koe Madam Deputy Speaker. I am delighted to speak at the first reading of this bill the Gore District Council (Otama Rural Water Supply) Bill.Hon Members: Arrr!RINO TIRIKATENE: I do like to pronounce words properly so it is definitely Gore"—you're supposed to roll those Rs because we're talking about a most beautiful place and a most beautiful region in Clutha-Southland. I want to acknowledge first of all Mark Patterson for sponsoring this bill on behalf of the Gore District Council and the community but also joining with him Hamish Walker Liz Craig and I'll throw myself in there too as a fellow MP that covers that beautiful part of the country.What we are considering here today has been summed up as being about local communities taking control. Here we have an important asset the Otama Rural Water Supply scheme which was largely funded and was founded by the farmers of that region. It has provided a valuable role in supplying water and reticulation to the farms and the communities of that area. There are three parties I guess to this bill. We have the Gore District Council we have the Otama Rural Water Supply Committee and ultimately we have the users of the scheme. This bill embodies I guess the resolution of some issues that have arisen in the past over who is responsible for what and ultimately who owns the scheme. What we're doing today is clarifying that and we're also putting in place a process whereby all of those three parties will be involved in ultimately transferring the ownership of that scheme to the Otama Rural Water Supply Committee.We have the council who are responsible for the day-to-day operations of this scheme and have done so and they report to the committee and the committee has actually been in charge of governing the overall operation and ultimately they foot the bill which is paid for by the users. So again we've had all these different roles that have played an important part and what we're doing now today is bringing clarity to those arrangements and ensuring that the ownership of that scheme returns to its rightful owners—the locals who have funded and supported and been part and parcel of this scheme right from its inception back in the 1970s.I want to acknowledge the Gore District Council for allowing this process to now proceed. The results from the referendum—the local referendum took that place from the 300-odd users—got a very very high response rate. And it got very very high—I believe the 75-plus percent—support for the returning local ownership to the scheme which will be represented by their company.We've heard some remarks made around the marae that benefits from this scheme and Te Rūnanga o Hokonui so I do want to give a shout-out to my whanaungas down in Hokonui who have been part and parcel I guess of this process and who are very supportive of it.Ko Oparure te maungaKo Te Rakaitauneke te tupunaKo Mata-mata tana taniwhaKo Hokonui te runangaKo Ngāi Tahu te iwi.[Oparure is the mountainTe Rakaitauneke is the ancestorMata-mata is his guardianHokonui is the tribal councilNgāi Tahu is the tribe.]I want to acknowledge them because if you ever get the chance there on Charlton Road is a wonderful marae complex of the Hokonui Rūnanga. They are very much passionate about their ancestral landscape which is demarcated by their ancestral tupuna and the mahinga kai their traditional areas are very important to them as are the rivers and of course as is the supply of fresh water. So with that I commend this bill at its first reading. Kia ora tātou."