Yang JianDr JIAN YANG (National): I rise to speak on the Gore District Council (Otama Rural Water Supply) Bill. Now first of all I would like to acknowledge Mark Patterson the sponsor of the bill and also would like to acknowledge my colleague the local MP Hamish Walker who went down to Gore along with some Governance and Administration Committee members to hear oral submissions in Gore.As I said before this bill is actually a quite straightforward bill and the case is quite straightforward. Basically a water scheme was built in the 1970s the contributors were largely the farmers who used the scheme and then a committee was set up. The committee members are overwhelmingly representatives of the farmers who use the scheme plus a local councillor. While the council is involved in the management of the scheme the committee or the users have actually covered the costs of the maintenance of the scheme. So historically it has not been very clear about the ownership of the scheme and people were not particularly concerned about this. However it is understood that the council now has the legal responsibility for the scheme. Then in May 2017 there was a public meeting regarding ownership and after the meeting there was a preliminary referendum in which 75 percent of the voters voted and then among those who voted about 75 percent voted for the ownership of the scheme to be transferred from the council to the committee. So that was a bit of history.It is clear that this has always been a community effort. It sounds very reasonable that the ownership of the scheme should be returned to the community. So the users would like the scheme to be returned to them so that they can ensure that the scheme continues to meet their needs and to be cost-effective. I believe this is largely about returning the scheme or rewarding a community effort because the scheme itself has always been regarded as a community effort and for that reason the scheme should be returned to the community. Now because of the preliminary referendum the council decided there should be a return to the committee and to the users and this bill will simply facilitate that transfer. We believe this is a practical and fair solution.Well this is not really a major bill or a huge bill. It is not a very significant economic asset because those who are affected by the bill or by this transfer or those who may benefit from the transfer are those farmers who use the scheme; so not a very large number. Nevertheless we believe that this is still a very important bill so the members of the Governance and Administration Committee went down to Gore to listen to the submitters. I think that was a very special effort made by the committee. Of course it's not very often that members of Parliament would travel down to that part of New Zealand to hear the oral submissions—but we did. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the submitters and particularly the leader of the scheme or the committee Mr Tom Affleck. Mr Tom Affleck was elected to the committee actually in 1972 and there he became the secretary of the committee in 1978 and stayed until 1993 and then he became the chair of the committee in 1993. So he has served on the committee for a long time. So I thank him for his effort and I thank all the submitters for their efforts. The submissions were very well-organised and the message was very very clear.After the hearing along with a couple of other members we went to visit the site. It was very impressive because to stand on top of the hill we could see a very beautiful piece of land—a very green land—and of course water is particularly important to the land and therefore to the farms.But this bill itself is not particularly about water. It's actually about water infrastructure—about some pipes and concrete. So this bill itself would actually enable the committee or local people or the users of the scheme to own the water infrastructure. So it's not about water itself.Now this bill also makes clear the steps to ensure a very smooth transfer and sustainable management of the scheme. It specifies the process for obtaining the authorisation to transfer the scheme. Now first of all there should be a referendum and if over 50 percent of the legal voters vote for the scheme to be transferred from the council to the new company—well the shareholders will be the farmers who use the scheme—then the council will start the process.Well of course there are some very specific requirements there around how to transfer the scheme from the council to the new company. First the referendum—and the referendum must be done within five years on which this scheme was supposed to be transferred.Now before the referendum the council needs to make some documents publicly available and that is also important because the voters will need time to read to digest and then to make decisions. It's important to make the process transparent—so such documents like the views of the medical officer of health the transfer plan and the proposed agreement outlining the roles and responsibilities of the company and any contractors including the council in relation to the scheme as prepared by the company. So this would as I said enable voters to have time to read those documents and then make informed decisions.The bill also specifies requirements for the plans and assessments. For instance the transfer plan needs to have five specific elements. So that's also listed—those five elements are listed in the particular bill. Also the company must prepare analysis of the types of contractual arrangements that the company will need to enter into with the council and other parties to obtain goods and services in relation to the maintenance and operation of the scheme because you do need to have a plan there to make sure that once that scheme is transferred to a new company a new company will be able to maintain the quality of the scheme—make sure that it's sustainable.The company must also assess the likely future capital and operating costs of the company to maintain and operate a scheme for a period of 30 years. So again the company is required to have a long-term plan in terms of maintaining and operating the scheme once they have ownership of the scheme. So all these documents will be accessible to the voters and will make sure that once the transfer is done this scheme will continue to operate in a sustainable way and cost-effectual way.Now the bill also defines who will be the eligible voters. Of course the residents in the area and the farmers who use the scheme will be legal voters. All these are clearly defined. So to conclude I will say this is a local bill. This is a bill which returns to the community what they deserve. Thanks.