Hodgson Pete: Health (Drinking Water) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Hodgson Pete: Health (Drinking Water) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:642;Page:11923] 
Hon PETE HODGSON (Minister of Health) 
: 
 If that last speech was quality debate then we are easy on this side of the Chamber. We are really happy if that speech was quality debate. Not one person on the other side of the Chamber has got up yet and said that clean water matters for a health system and that clean water is a basis of a society. No one has got up and said that but we have heard Dr Jonathan Coleman the smoking doctor from Auckland get up and say we do not have a problem. Well in Auckland we do not. 
In Auckland there is clean water. The providers of clean water in Auckland have come to me into my office and said: “Can you please pass this bill.” I asked why because they already meet the standards. They said they want legislative backing to ensure that they never lower their standards from where they are now. They said they want that standard in legislation. They want to make sure they can go to their stakeholders and say: “This water is clean because we’ve made it clean and because we must make it clean.” They travelled from Auckland to Wellington to say that. 
Where does Dr Jonathan Coleman the smoking doctor live? He lives in Auckland. Where does the next National speaker Dr Jackie Blue come from—the one who would have got up if I had not taken the call? She comes from Auckland. Where does Mr Tony Ryall come from? He comes from Tauranga and Tauranga meets the standards. But I will tell the Committee a couple of places that do not. The Catlins do not meet the standards and the Cardrona ski field does not meet the standards. 
I will tell the Committee what happened at the Cardrona ski field. Some sewage got caught up in some fresh water-supply. They had the water going out sitting above the mountain and the water for going in below. As a result there was an outbreak of poisoning. How do we know that? We know because a number of people came to the attention of a public health doctor on the ski field. We would not have known otherwise. That is a really important thing about water—most water-borne disease is not diagnosed. And it is not OK to require the proof of the need for clean water. Dirty water—water that contains a lot of coliforms; water that contains a lot of material that should not be in clean water—is just not OK in 2007. 
But there is a problem and that is that water supplies are often managed on behalf of very small populations. It is not fair for those very small populations to have to bear the burden of a very substantial infrastructure deficit. It is not fair and it is particularly not fair when sometimes those water supplies have to be made bigger to cope with perhaps a summer rush of tourism. That is not fair. So this good Labour Government said: “We can help.” We went to Local Government New Zealand and said we could help meet the costs and would do so according to a formula. I think the money we said we would put in was 153 million bucks. I am not sure but it is of that ilk. That money is there because this Government invests in health instead of rushing to give tax cuts everywhere. That is the difference. 
Jacqui Dean 
: Aw! 
Hon PETE HODGSON 
: The woman who has just left this Chamber saying “Aw!” wants to see water banned. She is the woman who wrote to a ministerial colleague on this side of the Chamber saying that dihydrogen monoxide is something she is terribly worried about and wants banned. She is an expert on water—dihydrogen monoxide! That is the quality of debate we get from that side of the House. That is the quality of the debate now. 
Mr Ryall said he wants to know what the costs are. Well I will tell him about costs. The costs have been inflated by the National Party since this bill came into the House. That party purports to want to be the Government one day yet on the issue of clean water all it can do is add a zero to the costs and say the bill costs too much. Well it does not cost too much if we take the zero off. Mr Jonathan Coleman with his $2.7 billion—wherever he got that from I have no idea. It sounds like a couple of zeroes to me. That member ought to be a little more particular about his estimates. So should his leader. His leader went to the Local Government New Zealand conference in Dunedin and gave a quote for a water supply in the Catlins. The problem was that the quote was out by more than tenfold. 
How do we know what the real cost is? Well the Ministry of Health sent an engineering team in to do it. The local council because it did not trust the ministry sent its engineering team in as well. So they came up with two quotes and Mr Key took the bigger of them and added a zero and then a bit more and put it into his speech—as if he was telling the truth! This is a guy who continues to shift and in this case he just shifted a zero on to the figures to make his argument look better. The truth of the matter is that New Zealand purports to be a modern nation and a modern nation needs a modern water-supply. It is really basic. It is like saying that 200 or 230 or 250 volts will do. Well no; it will not. It has to be spot on. And water has to be spot on. This Government is co-investing with local governments to ensure that we move step by step towards a cleaner water-supply for all New Zealanders.