SpeechANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Oh Madam Speaker. I didn't understand that I was on a split call. However that's fine. I will just do five minutes.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): My apologies. The split call is the next call.ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: Thank you Madam Speaker. First and foremost I'd just like to acknowledge the very short speech from the member who's just resumed his seat Simon Court. Sounds like he had a really sore throat so I'm hoping that you are well Mr Court.I want to stand and make a contribution to this bill and I am quite delighted. I really enjoy sitting in select committee where we are all in agreement and we work our best to make a good bill even better. In this case we didn't need to do much—in fact we didn't make any changes to the bill but we certainly completely covered the issue I believe.So the Palmerston North Reserves Empowering Amendment Bill—look we've heard from the other members in the House about what this bill does. I would like to first and foremost acknowledge Tangi Utikere the member for Palmerston North who is the sponsor of this local bill and—as we have heard—previously the Deputy Mayor of Palmerston North. So he has a full and thorough understanding of this bill.Nevertheless I do want to also make the point that this is a local bill. So he has brought this bill as the member but it is not his piece of legislation that he brings to the House. An important distinction I believe that needs to be reiterated.So Palmerston North Papaioea Palmy is the topic that we are talking about today. I Googled What is special about Palmerston North?" because I did admit in the second debate that I had only visited once and had attended the Fitzroy Tavern which is no longer there. So what is special about Palmerston North besides the very good member of course?The catch phrase is "Palmerston North has what it takes to exercise body and mind." So I thought "Well that sounds very cool and in fact there is a whole pile of really exciting things that you can do in Palmerston North" which I won't traverse. Nevertheless I would just like to point out that point number six of the 10 things was the food and the cafe lifestyle. So that was a bit more of me than the activities.So what does this bill do? I think it's important to talk about what this bill does. Currently as we know there is certain land held under the Palmerston North Reserves Act 1922 the former Act and land under this Act cannot be sold. The council wishes to be able to sell this land for development if it becomes surplus to council requirements. This bill provides the mechanism for this by amending the Palmerston North Reserves Empowering Act 1966 which is the principal Act.Look this bill has six clauses and clause 4 and clause 5 are the most relevant. In fact clause 4 tells us the purpose: to be able to sell. Clause 5: the effect of the amendment is that the land described in Schedule 5 is vested in the council and it is no longer subject to the provisions of the former Act which is the Palmerston North Reserves Empowering Act 1966.It is 1.6 hectares of land. Known as we have heard as the Huia Street Reserve located on the corner of Fitzherbert Ave and Park Road in Palmerston North. There are four parcels of land: lots 1 to 4. Lots 3 and 4 and a bit of lot 2—just a bit of lot 2—are leased to a tennis club on a 10-year lease with another 10-year right of renewal.So the community has been talking about this piece of land for quite some time. For many years in fact we have heard about the legislation that was attempted to be brought through in 2007 which didn't pass. We have heard also about the drone footage that we've seen of the site and we also heard from a number of submitters. We had 29 submissions and eight oral submitters speak to us.I think the important thing there was we were lucky to have drone footage because people were quite confused as to where this land was and what the areas were. I think it was important that—and I'm not sure how it works—so we've put it into Hansard that there is drone footage but I'm not sure how that actually gets transcribed or put or whether in fact there is in any way that technology and Hansard can reflect where we're talking about. I suspect we don't quite have that capability and it will have to be the legal description of the lots added in there.So we did have the drone footage; it is really clear that this is quite a useful piece of land. It is covered as a reserve and I acknowledge the Hon Eugenie Sage's contribution where she talked about you know making sure that reserve land doesn't just disappear and the point being made that there will be if this land is sold some opportunities to go back to a recreational purpose for the sale of this land.I want to just talk a little bit about the history of Palmerston North for a moment. In 1866—Hon Member: Must you?ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: The members across the other side are suddenly very interested; I'm pleased to see that. In 1866 Palmerston North was founded but—sorry I should say Palmerston was founded. Fascinating fact for you all here in the House today because I know you're fascinated about this: in 1873 the word "North" was inserted. That is because we have a Palmerston in the South Island and it is incredibly important—[Interruption]ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ian McKelvie): Order! Order! I'd just ask the members on my left to listen very carefully to this. This is very important.ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: Thank you Mr Speaker. So the word "North" was inserted. Fascinating quip. In fact I won't tell you about the time when we first had an exchange in Ōkaihau where I grew up.Hon Member: You just did.ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: OK I will then. Well we had the new dial-tone phones instead of the ring phones and we rang Palmerston instead of Palmerston North and spoke to someone for quite some time and then realised it was the wrong person. Anyway—I know that was a funny story. I digress. Right back to Palmerston North. In 1930 Palmerston North became a city. I think that that's quite interesting given that I've not visited this place and perhaps I should. We have—well besides the pub of course. So I'd just also like to note there is a little bit of controversy around Palmerston North and the term "Palmy". Now some of you here will know that Palmerston North is known as "Palmy" and in fact there is a huge controversy about this. So in fact the local council has said that their long-term plan is the Palmy 2021-31 long-term plan and people are up in arms about that and rightly so.So back to the bill. Quite clearly we have an election coming up for councillors in the city. This bill simply enables the possibility of sale for this land. It's important that people in Palmerston North go to vote to make their wishes clear around this so the elected members will make this decision going forward. It's incredibly important that people pay attention to this matter if they think it needs to be addressed. And with that I commend the bill to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ian McKelvie): I call Stuart Smith. I understand it's a five-minute call.Hon Members: Awww!"