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Ngobi TerisaTERISA NGOBI (Labour—Ōtaki): Thank you Madam Speaker for the opportunity just to take a short call on the second reading of the Integrity Sport and Recreation Bill. Given the kaupapa and especially the focus namely around sports and women I just want to take a moment to acknowledge the recent passing of a wahine toa in the sporting field: Leanne Harrison from Ngatokowaru in the Ōtaki electorate who was the president of the Horowhenua Netball Association and will leave a massive gap in the Horowhenua netball communities. Moe mai ra e hoa and my aroha goes to Erana Anna Bill Justine Michelle and Jody. Thank you for indulging me Madam Speaker. This bill as we have heard and the commission that will be established will address and support integrity issues at all levels from elite sports to grassroots the community sports and everything in between. This bill the commission will look after the wellbeing of all people who participate in sports—all people who participate in sports and that includes women that includes our rainbow people and that's what this bill is so good about. It makes sure it supports the wellbeing of all people who participate in sports. As a member of the Social Services and Community Committee I want to thank also the submitters—the over 100 submitters—that submitted on this bill. I took the time to do that but I also want to thank the officials that helped us work through it. Of course the Minister for bringing this important kaupapa to the table and I'm not just saying that because everyone wants the fill a space I really do mean that; it's an important piece of legislation to make sure that we support again all people who participate in sports. As our colleagues around the House tonight have said it was collegial for the most part there was differing views on rainbow people and I'm really glad where we were able to land because again this bill will support all people who participate in sport and that includes our rainbow our takatāpui our women and everyone else in between.The other thing I like about this bill is it protects the participants who raise integrity matters and that's really important as well. The bill provides protection for participants and other people that make a complaint or provide information to the commission and the bill requires that to be confidential information—really key. So again I love that about this bill. I love that it protects all people that participate in sports and I also love that this bill is not just for the elite not just for the professionals but the grassroots as well and everyone in between. Great piece of legislation and I commend this bill to the House.
Williams ArenaARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa): Tēnā koe Madam Speaker. Safer fairer and more inclusive sport—that's something we can all get behind and I acknowledge those members of the Social Services and Community Committee who have reached a pretty good outcome on this bill. They have heard from submitters who have approached these submissions with a lot of knowledge and goodwill and have come back to the House with a number of really sensible changes.This will be a short and simple call for what is a pretty short and simple bill and it's a good one. It deals with the problem of how we make complaints in our sports systems and prior to this bill several reports into New Zealand's sport and physical recreation sector found that there is insufficient capability to deal with integrity-related issues particularly the management of complaints within the system. That is an issue that this House needs to address.We all need to have faith in our sporting system and the people who are participating in it so the creation of the Integrity Sport and Recreation Commission is a great solution to that and that has a wide remit. My colleague Chris Penk who's just taken his seat is right to comment that it is a wide remit. It includes threats to integrity including doping in sport competition manipulation bullying sexual misconduct racism and other behaviours that undermine sport and recreation in New Zealand. That's not things that any New Zealander wants to see in our sports and so this solution deals with that issue in a way that everyone can accept.I want to conclude my comments by thanking those members of the committee who made a particular contribution throughout the process particularly Ricardo Menéndez March and my colleague Dr Emily Henderson. Having an expert on the way that children engage with procedural law and with complaints in the room in a select committee is something that the New Zealand Parliament has benefited from and I thank Dr Henderson for her contribution. I commend this bill.
Henderson Emily; Dean JacquiDr EMILY HENDERSON (Labour—Whangārei): I rise to speak in support of this bill as a member of the Social Services and Community Committee who worked long and hard upon it and if I may I will begin by reiterating the comment made by various colleagues around the House that it was a most collegial working process. I particularly enjoyed getting into the minutiae with the Hon Michael Woodhouse and I don't think that clause 19 will ever leave me.As has been said by Mr Woodhouse and also by our wonderful chair Ms Warren-Clark this was a bill that came to us in pretty good shape. We believe it left in better shape.This is a bill that sets up a commission that will look to guide and lead our sporting codes to create their own codes within their own disciplines which will look to enhance the integrity of sport by setting up essentially complaints processes. So there will be codes of the principles under which people are to operate and then complaints processes accountability for offenders when they are found to be offenders and protection for whistleblowers. The complaints process will be in an accessible form that will be appropriate for the often very young people who come before it. Making sure the complaints process will be child friendly young people friendly was one of the excellent changes the committee is recommending.We came to this bill for the simple reason that there is a desperate need for it. We have already heard referred to in this House the tragedy of Olivia Podmore and we have also had her colleagues bravely speak to us about their experiences of abuse and bullying within the codes described here tonight.I am as I have said before in this House no sportswoman but I am the mother of a young sportswoman and one of the things that was very apparent to us was the real vulnerability particularly of young sportswomen in these disciplines who are sadly open to abuse. As someone who has worked on institutional abuse cases it's often remarked that in any place where there is a strong hierarchy and little power to participants there is an environment ripe for abuse. And the sad truth is that that does happen unfortunately in some of our sporting codes where it should not happen. Sport should be a matter of joy and pride that it is in most cases. I strongly commend this bill to the House and look forward to hearing further speeches upon it.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Chris Penk—five-minute call.
Kanongata'a AnahilaANAHILA KANONGATA'A (Labour): Thank you e te Mana Whakawā. It's an honour and a privilege to make a brief contribution on the Integrity Sport and Recreation Bill. As we've heard the bill establishes the Integrity Sport and Recreation Commission and it sets out its powers and its functions. The commission will be an independent Crown entity and it will have seven to nine members. What I like about the membership is that a minimum of two members must have experience and knowledge of Te Ao Māori and tikanga Māori because I think that's really important in terms of our commitment to the Treaty of Waitangi.Also what it does is the commission has to identify integrity codes and it also includes anti-sports and anti-doping. I want to acknowledge the—what? 180?—Angie Warren-Clark: 183.ANAHILA KANONGATA'A: —183 submitters acknowledging that there were a lot of form submitters. But I want to acknowledge that there have been some discussions held in those submissions that as a country even though some of the things that were said were hard to listen to we needed to have that conversation. And I want to respect everybody whose views were heard by the committee but I think it was a place to have listened and have heard.I want to acknowledge Madam Chair and of course the member Michael Woodhouse who has also made very good contributions in our select committee work but also the work of Ricardo Menéndez March from the rainbow community. One of the submitters said that they want to change the word from rainbow community" to "rainbow people". So I want to acknowledge those changes and I just want to acknowledge that the committee—it has been said many times that the work of the committee is valuable in terms of changing the law. I know that there are some changes that are coming about into this bill which is welcomed and I welcome the conversations that we have on that.But I do want to commend the Minister on his leadership and his passion about getting sports right for women and children and basically for Aotearoa. On that note I commend this bill to the House."
Warren-Clark AngieANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. I appreciate the opportunity to talk to this bill. As the chair of the Social Services and Community Committee I do have to absolutely agree with the member who's just resumed his seat—Michael Woodhouse—on the collegial way that we worked across the matters that were raised with us. Look this piece of legislation is long overdue I believe and I really want to acknowledge the Minister for Sport and Recreation for presenting to us a piece of legislation that was pretty damned good in its first blush. We have done some work on it and made some changes and essentially where we've landed I think is satisfactory for everyone. We had some really good advice but certainly we had 183 submissions—all groups or individuals—and we heard from 19 submitters from Wellington or by Zoom videoconference. The purpose of this bill quite simply is to strengthen the integrity of sport and recreation. It sets up an independent Crown entity—a commission—to do a number of things and I'm just going to run very quickly through those. There'll be between seven and nine members on this commission. Their work will include developing and issuing integrity codes. We heard about the anti-doping functions which will be collapsed in from Drug Free Sport New Zealand which is really important and again I put it on record as well how effective they have been. This is a sensible process and movement. They will be investigating and resolving integrity matters. There will be independent methods for resolving disputes which is really important. We did some changes in there to ensure that those whistleblowers or people who were making some commentary around what was going on in sports were actually protected to do so and it's very important that their confidentiality is maintained. There is a lot that we tweaked with this bill and one of the things that has been mentioned is around children. It's really important. Many of us here on this side of the House have worked in the child protection area and we thought it incredibly important that we ensure that child protection is at the forefront of some of the policies that exist in some of the direction. I also want to acknowledge that at times we heard from submitters in the community who were out of scope in relation to the gender identity of members playing sport. It became quite divisive at times but I think that as a team and as a select committee we worked well across that. We were able to listen to opinions regardless of whether we changed anything in the legislation. We made very certain that girls and women were at the forefront of the work that we do and we've included changing the term rainbow communities" to "rainbow people". So with that I commend this bill to the House."
Voting — Correction—Spatial Planning Bill
Dean Jacqui; Sage EugenieASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Members the House is resumed. When we broke for the dinner break the House was considering the Integrity Sport and Recreation Bill.VOTINGCorrection—Spatial Planning BillHon EUGENIE SAGE (Green): Point of order. Thank you Madam Speaker. Could I seek leave to correct the voting record for the Spatial Planning Bill?ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is none.Hon EUGENIE SAGE (Green): Te Paati Māori two votes opposed; Meka Whaitiri one vote opposed. Thank you.
Integrity Sport and Recreation Bill — Second Reading
Sosene Lemauga LydiaLEMAUGA LYDIA SOSENE (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. As the final speaker for the Government on this side of the House I support the Spatial Planning Bill in the third reading. I want to thank the fabulous contributions particularly on this side of the House. I want to thank all the select committee members the officials and especially acknowledge the chair Eugenie Sage. On that note I commend this bill to the House.
Rosewarne DanDAN ROSEWARNE (Labour): It's a pleasure to take a short call on the third reading of the Spatial Planning Bill. The Spatial Planning Bill has a single function and that's the creation and implementation of regional spatial strategies. This will do a few things including national consistency across key aspects of all those strategies.I'd just like to touch on the regional spatial strategies. They will help achieve the purpose of the Natural and Built Environment Bill which is intertwined. And while the Spatial Planning Bill is a separate and new part of the resource management system it's intrinsically linked to the Natural and Built Environment Bill. And as the Minister David Parker said in his opening remarks regional spatial strategies will become a vehicle for the delivery of infrastructure in the right places and at the right time. These are needed to provide a clear direction to the private sector as well as local government and central government agencies like those responsible for transport and housing. The regional spatial strategy will be unique to the region. I've subbed in on the Environment Committee on a number of occasions when this bill was at the committee stage and there were some good submissions particularly around light pollution around the Tekapō area. Those of you who have been down to that fantastic part of the country will be aware that Tekapō and the surrounding areas are a light pollution - free zone which lies below one of the largest international dark-sky reserves in the world only one of four such reserves in the world. So whether it's areas that should be protected from light pollution or areas with significant biodiversity or productive land or even the risk of sea level rise this bill protects those areas well into the future. So it's a good bill a pragmatic bill and I commend it to the house.
Pallett SarahSARAH PALLETT (Labour—Ilam): It gives me great pleasure to rise in support of the Spatial Planning Bill although my credulity has been stretched listening to some of the speakers earlier—not from this side of the House I hasten to add. I was really making reference as one would understand to the other side of the House. I would really refer to the previous speaker Tama Potaka who referred to his uneducated lens" and that pretty much sums it up. When we compare the input of the Hon Rachel Brooking who has had in excess of 20 years as a resource management lawyer and the many many years this legislation has been in the creation.I do want to acknowledge and thank the extremely hard-working Environment Committee. I am not a part of that august committee but I have had the great privilege of sitting on it as a substitute member of Parliament and to acknowledge the hard work of the Hon Eugenie Sage and of course the Minister described as "inexperienced" by Simon Court the Hon David Parker elected in 2002 and a Minister for two parliamentary terms as well as being our Attorney-General. "Inexperienced"—interesting!This bill is going to tackle problems such as lengthy delays in consenting development applications high consenting costs—even those for relatively straightforward development plans—inconsistent and poorly written district plans a lack of national direction and guidance to councils and patchy inconsistent and ineffective environmental protection across the country.This bill will allow for planning for positive outcomes. It will condense 100 district plans into 16 regional plans. It will allow new standardised conditions with fewer bespoke consents. Stronger more consistent national direction is something that developers across the country have been pleading for for many years and that is why I would like to commend this bill to the House."
Warren-Clark Angie; Salesa JennyANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. I'm delighted to stand once again to speak in the House on the Spatial Planning Bill. We worked through this bill concurrently alongside the previous bill we've mentioned today the Natural and Built Environment Bill. It was an interesting process to do that because I completely agree with the member the Hon Eugenie Sage; the difference in the two pieces of legislation are quite marked. This is a much simpler piece of legislation and in fact a piece of legislation that people across the country have been asking for.I spend a lot of time with developers and builders etc.; of course we have a family business doing so. One of the things that in the community of Tauranga the Bay of Plenty we worked across Government and across regionally to work with the UFTI group—the Urban Form Transport Infrastructure group. The biggest ask in that group was that the Government was at the table alongside the central and local councils.That was really important that they were there and this one of the things that this bill does. Essentially it's giving that long view of what a community or place-making should look like. It's that up-to-30-years plan and it's important that we have this oversight. It's about making the right decisions for our communities. It's cutting back from about a hundred plans to about 16; that tells us really simply that we need to start thinking about our communities as not being discreet and individual but also connected. I think this is a really useful piece of legislation.Just before I take my seat I do want to acknowledge the long—many long—hours that the select committee took but also for our officials from the Ministry for the Environment who worked weekends who worked all sorts of hours to bring us really sound and good advice and our clerk team as well who were there organising and orchestrating the constant movement that occurred; a tremendous effort. To the Hon Eugenie Sage and the Hon Rachel Brooking as well as the Hon David Parker this is a good piece of legislation that all three of you have shepherded through this House. I utterly commend it to the House.ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): The next call is a split call. I call on Tama Potaka for five minutes.
Twyford PhilHon PHIL TWYFORD (Labour—Te Atatū): Thank you Madam Chair. Well it's good to follow Barbara Kuriger an outstanding member of the Environment Committee. In the last term of Parliament as Minister of Housing and Urban Development I instigated and oversaw a series of regional planning initiatives also known as the urban growth partnerships starting in the mighty Waikato Wellington Bay of Plenty and the Auckland-Hamilton Corridor. The approach that we took was to get multiple councils: regional city district together in the room. Mana whenua there right from the beginning looking out over a 30 year horizon. Central government in the room with local government and iwi. High level spatial plans maps looking out into the future taking into account growth projections for economic growth and population growth dealing with climate adaptation natural hazards infrastructure—the network infrastructure roads and water particularly and the protection of ecological and cultural assets. It's basically the approach that is reflected in the Spatial Planning Bill. I saw the enthusiasm and commitment that all of those actors local government particularly brought to that enterprise. They were keen as to get in the room with all of the other players to do spatial planning way beyond the governance boundaries of their councils recognising that land markets housing the movement of people transport take no account of those boundaries—they are a hindrance. There were two real standout performers—people have mentioned the Waikato councils but also the Bay of Plenty were fantastic and they demonstrated a willingness to work together to think about long-term growth projections to reform zoning in order to deliver more housing and more urban growth and also to consider how to futureproof and modernise the transport networks to support the kind of growth they wanted.This bill the Spatial Planning Bill enshrines that approach in law and puts it at the heart of the new resource management system. It's an excellent approach. It's long overdue. The regional spatial strategies that will be produced by the planning committees will inform and provide direction and context for the natural and built environment plans. I believe that these regional spatial strategies will significantly improve the environmental outcomes. They will give communities more of a say in the really important choices and challenges facing our regions. They will make it easier for our towns and cities to grow particularly by identifying the important corridors for future growth the early marking out of grids for roads and network infrastructure like water and this will enable the supply of land and development opportunities that will make our urban land markets more competitive something that has been sorely lacking under the existing planning system now for several decades. I commend this bill to the House.
Roberts AngelaANGELA ROBERTS (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. I always love a bill where we get to quote economists—yay. It's a good day—a good day in the House. As we know economics is fundamentally about the systems that we use to allocate our resources right? You know who gets to decide what we do with our stuff? Do we use it do we transform it do we protect it and who gets to benefit from that?In recent years we've seen a shift away more and more from those decisions being driven by the market and being driven by an insatiable desire for growth. The Resource Management Act was an attempt to try and help manage the damage that was done by allowing our resource decisions to be made by the market fundamentally. We've seen shifts in the ways economists think and sociologists think and Treasury—we can see as they've incorporated our living standards framework.This bill is another piece that helps us to shift fundamentally from a growth-led to a sustainability-led economy. It's quite exciting. It enables us to fundamentally shift the way we operate our economy.Students of modern-day economics—not those of us who studied when Mr Gekko was around in the last millennium—would have heard of Kate Raworth and her concepts that she introduces in Doughnut Economics. She talks about us living between where we've got fundamental social foundations that are strong and healthy and an ecological ceiling and we have to try and live within that.This bill helps. The intention—the collaboration that was required to tackle such a complex problem is evident. We've heard about the years of reviews and consultation and engagement and the changes that were made at select committee and that collaboration is valued by those of us who luckily just got to sit outside and watch this massive piece of work being done.I'm going to finish by quoting Kate Raworth. She says Today we have economies that need to grow whether or not they make us thrive. What we need are economies that make us thrive whether or not they grow." And so I commend this bill to the House."
Warren-Clark AngieANGIE WARREN-CLARK (Labour): Thank you Mr Speaker. It is an utter pleasure to stand here today and to speak on this bill. It has taken such a lot of time in this term to go through so before I thank members etc. I want to just talk about the fact that we consulted on the exposure draft as an inquiry in 2021 so those members on the Environment Committee have been sitting with this process for a long time. We had the Randerson review land in July 2019 and we began our work there and then of course we had the Natural and Built Environment Bill come to us. We have spent many many many months working on this piece of legislation but rightly so because it has been 32 years since there was a proper and actual review that needed to occur across the whole system. We have carved up cut out and added to the Resource Management Act in too many ways for that piece of legislation to effectively protect our environment so I'm really delighted to be here speaking. I want to acknowledge as others have the stellar chairing by the Hon Eugenie Sage who had the foresight to work with us all in such an amazing way to ensure that we all kept talking. She was completely over the detail of every submission and was such a valuable chairperson. We are very lucky to have had her in our select committee and I—we've all said it but actually this is 1000 pages of legislation that she knows every word of. So I do want to acknowledge that and I would also like to acknowledge the Minister David Parker for the collaborative work that he did across the community as well.This bill does something that very simply—very simply we have moved from a Resource Management Act to a Natural and Built Environment Bill.Hon Member: What does that mean? Explain it.ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: This means that we have put the environment back into our legislation. We have put the environment at the front of—Simon Court: Environmental protection?ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: I won't say it again but that's what it has done. So we are incredibly—on this side of the House this is a piece of work that we have been working extremely hard for.Simon Court: [Walks toward exit] I'm wasting my time with you lot. ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: I'm extremely proud of the fact that we have got this across the line and as a consequence—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Mr Court!Simon Court: Yes sir.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Excuse me you do not make gratuitous comments while you're walking. You will go back to your seat and you will stand withdraw and apologise.Simon Court: [Returns to seat] I withdraw and apologise.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Thank you. Now make a nice quiet dignified exit please. Can I just add that time? Add another minute to the speaker.ANGIE WARREN-CLARK: Another minute? Thank you sir. I'm actually just about to take my seat.But what I do want to say is that I'm incredibly proud of our Government for doing this piece of work. We have done it on behalf of the people of this country. Each and every person who has ever worked under the Resource Management Act has found some difficulties and we're fixing them. I commend this bill to the House.
Natural and Built Environment Bill — Third Reading
Bennett DavidHon DAVID BENNETT (National): Thank you Mr Speaker. The National Party opposes this bill not for the clauses around the wānanga but for other clauses in the bill. Just as someone from Hamilton that grew up in Te Awamutu I just want to acknowledge the wānanga and the great work that you do in our community and the many lives that you have changed for the better so thank you for your work. But our problem in New Zealand is our education system. At a very younger age it is just failing our people and it's failing in a number of ways. We need to see real change at that primary school that early childhood education and at that secondary school level so that people actually have the skills to engage in the wānanga or other forms of education. That's why we oppose school board of trustees elections processes which are mandated by Government rather than being left to communities and schools to dictate who has got the interest and the desire to be on those trustees. That is the primary concern we have in this bill.As someone that went through a Catholic boy's education you know I think when you look at our education system and you compare it with Australia for example there is a big difference in that we do not have a very strong independent schooling network. We do not have a very strong integrated schooling network. They are very small percentages of our total schooling network. I think that competition but also the values and the approach taken in those schools has shown to be very effective. If you look in Hamilton for example Church College was one of the pre-eminent schools in the city and no longer is there. And you can go through a number of other Maōri education facilities that you know had a religious basis but actually had quite a strong effect on education.And no I'm not an overly religious person—don't get me wrong—but what I'm saying is that we need more balance in the education system. If you look at Australia for example a third of their education system is integrated or—Angela Roberts: Yeah and gets truckloads of money.Hon DAVID BENNETT: No one-third of their system is actually integrated or private schools or schools that actually have a religious bent to them you could say but it's actually the values they teach. And I think that that's really important. If we really wanted to do something about getting our primary school education better we should be focusing on those kind of changes which reflect what is working in other countries rather than these changes in this bill.
Sosene Lemauga Lydia; O'Connor GregLEMAUGA LYDIA SOSENE (Labour): It's a real privilege to make a short contribution today on the Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 3). I am a member of the Education and Workforce Committee and we had the pleasure of hearing submissions from wānanga. I also want to thank my colleagues and the officials for their work.I asked to speak on this bill because I want to acknowledge the work of the wānanga for Pasefika. I wanted to acknowledge and mention in particular and thank Te Wānanga o Aotearoa in Māngere in South Auckland who has a huge registration of Pasefika students. Their work in this kaupapa has been really integral for our local community and I want to thank kaumātua; I want to thank iwi Māori and hapū for their kaupapa and for enabling in Māngere—in South Auckland—the huge contribution to the Pasefika learners in our community to be able to progress forward in their lives because they have attended the local wānanga.In my short contribution I really just wanted to highlight two specific points. The first one is establish and support the governance framework for wānanga. This is a huge recognition and a significant milestone to enable wānanga to have that kōrero to be able to dictate their terms to be able to maintain and acknowledge mana and rangatiratanga of the wānanga and the uniqueness of the wānanga.I want to acknowledge the contribution from our Ministers Tinetti Davis and Jackson—who always has a colourful contribution to remind us where we have come from to where we are going. It is important that the bill is an enabler to allow iwi and wānanga to be able to have that kōrero to be comfortable and specifically in their time. Because rather than be dictated to they need to tell us what is comfortable. I thank wānanga for the enormous contribution for Pasefika whānau and aiga that they have been able to make in Aotearoa.The second point is the changes to school board of trustees and eligibility. I've served two decades on boards of trustees and school committees. It is really important for our students—our rangatahi—and their whānau to feel safe and to understand that the governance of that school community has the safety has the education aspirations for the young people of that school community. On that note I commend this bill to the House. Fa'afetai.DEPUTY SPEAKER: This is a five-minute split call. The Hon David Bennett.
Hipango Harete; Davis KelvinHARETE HIPANGO (National): Thank you Madam Chair. Minister I note your colleague Minister Jackson was nodding as my colleague Penny Simmonds was making submissions around the issue of timeliness. So Minister the Education and Workforce Committee report—I didn't sit on the select committee but I have read the report—it states very clearly that: Section 390 of the Act protects the use of the terms 'university' 'polytechnic' and 'institute of technology' " and that "All three wānanga told us the term 'wānanga' should similarly be a protected term." The select committee report also clearly states: "However there has not been adequate consultation and robust policy development for this proposal." which is further reinforced by a statement in relation to Crown entity wānanga and non-Crown entity wānanga that "There is insufficient time at this stage of the legislative process".Minister it's noted that when this bill was introduced to the House on 28 March of this year submissions were called for with a closing date of 1 May 2023. Is it the Minister's opinion and evidence that 24 working days—24 working days—was sufficient and respectful consultation with the three wānanga represented here in this Whare today?Hon KELVIN DAVIS (Associate Minister of Education (Māori Education)): As I said earlier this has been probably five years in the making the discussions with the wānanga. She's asking whether 20-something days is enough time—look to be honest we've got to this point and the only thing that is holding this up are the questions that are coming."
Salesa Jenny; Dean Jacqui; Belich Camilla; Tinetti JanASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): I declare the House in committee for consideration of the Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 3).EDUCATION AND TRAINING AMENDMENT BILL (NO 3)In CommitteeParts 1 to 3 the Schedule and clauses 1 to 3CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jacqui Dean): Members the House is in committee on the Education and Training Amendment Bill (No 3). We come first to Part 1. This is the debate on clauses 4 to 16—CAMILLA BELICH (Junior Whip—Labour): Point of order. I seek leave for all provisions to be taken as one question.CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jacqui Dean): Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is none. The question is that Parts 1 to 3 the Schedule and clauses 1 to 3 stand part.Hon JAN TINETTI (Minister of Education): Thank you Madam Chair. I'm delighted to be here in the committee of the whole House for this very important bill that we are taking through the House. I do want to say that I've got my Associate Minister of Education (Māori Education) in the Chamber the Hon Kelvin Davis as well. I know that there are some aspects of this bill that he has been working very hard on so I may vacate the chair at some point to hand over to him if there are specific questions around that.But what I am introducing here this morning is Supplementary Order Paper 406 to fix minor drafting errors in the bill. This is presented in the form of a revision-tracked version of the bill that will be used during the committee of the whole House. The Supplementary Order Paper makes a change so that for the purposes of developing an Order in Council made under clause 9 the annual report of a wānanga on the remuneration of employees and former employees for amounts of $100000 or above must include a report on the remuneration of the chief executive of the wānanga. This is to make clause 9 consistent with clause 25 of the bill which makes the same change generally for university and wānanga annual reporting on employee and former employee remunerations.New section 398K provides for the appointment of members to the council of a wānanga. A minor change has been proposed that allows for the nomination of members as well as appointments. Minor changes have been made to new section 398S for consistency to ensure that the requirements of non-Crown entity wānanga relating to the application of the Public Audit Act can be found in the same section. Consequently minor changes have also been made to new section 398J and new section 94A.The rest of the changes in the Supplementary Order Paper are focused on minor technical changes improving readability and correcting small drafting errors such as grammar or adding in missing cross references.
Rosewarne DanDAN ROSEWARNE (Labour): As it stands this bill will provide significant savings for New Zealand and also in addition better health outcomes. The average household will be seeing savings of between $2700 and $5400 per year. Without these reforms the cost for the consumer will be significantly more. And I just want to also touch on the health aspect of this. What I have here is a Facebook post from the Waimakariri District Council—so just in North Canterbury there—and it's about the boil water notice and I just want to read it out for the house just quickly. It was from four days ago: A boil water notice has been issued for the Oxford No. 1 Water Supply … Please inform any neighbours or friends on the scheme who may not be aware of this notice … We are carrying out extensive flushing of the well and will be monitoring [it] closely over the weekend. If it does not improve we will have to consider taking it offline for re-development … which could take up to a month … Residents on this supply need to use boiled tap water or store-bought bottled water for drinking cleaning teeth making ice washing dishes and preparing food until further notice. Tap water should be boiled on a rolling boil for one minute." So that's a significant concern. This is in one of our communities in North Canterbury. And Mr Bayly and Mr Bishop in their contributions mentioned the "Stop Three Waters" signs. When I get out and about around the community those "Stop Three Waters" signs are interestingly in the same locations as where all the boil-water notices are—in the same areas. Anna Lorck in her contribution talked about what consumers really want. Most people just want to be able to turn on the tap and have clean water come out. It's as simple as that. Unfortunately the Opposition has decided to make it into an issue that's trying to divide our country when in fact the average punter doesn't care. The average punter just wants clean water to come out of the tap. And it's important that—we owe it to New Zealand; we owe it to Havelock North—we do not have a repeat of those instances that we've had in the past. So it's for that reason that I commend the bill to the House."
Lorck AnnaANNA LORCK (Labour—Tukituki): Thank you Madam Speaker. This is an opportunity for me to talk about Hawke's Bay and the contribution that Hawke's Bay has made to the Water Services Entities Amendment Bill. Hawke's Bay put forward a proposal that agreed that reform was necessary. Hawke's Bay put forward a proposal about how joining forces together as councils they could provide an option for an entity that would enable the region to deal with its water infrastructure. As the local MP for Tukituki I strongly advocated for Hawke's Bay in their solution towards water reform. This bill has seen and listened to a large part of what Hawke's Bay was saying. We now have 10 entities that will look to implement affordable water reform. When you join forces you enable a cross-subsidisation for rates and one of the reasons that we need to have councils working together is being able to afford the massive cost of infrastructure that is needed to bring our water infrastructure up to world-class standards. So by joining forces for the entity that will serve Hawke's Bay and Tairāwhiti we now have our councils welcoming this reform and that is a significant improvement in how we're going to go forward in enabling access to safe drinking water where we know that when we turn the tap on clean water that is safe to drink will come out of the tap. This is what this water reform is about and this is why we need to work together to make sure that those costs that ratepayers are looking at are not too big for the ratepayers going forward. But we all know—in this House and right across New Zealand—that affordable water reform is necessary. I don't want to see what happened in my electorate where over 5000 people got sick and people died and a large part of that was because despite warning after warning to invest in maintaining our water infrastructure we didn't and that can never be allowed to happen again in New Zealand. I think this bill will make sure that what happened in Havelock North never happens again in this country. And that is why I commend this bill to the House and thank Hawke's Bay my region for the enormous contribution they have made to ensuring that we put forward a bill that will work. Thank you Madam Speaker.
White HelenHELEN WHITE (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. I wanted to talk about the power of the issue of water in our lives. The United Nations in 2010 declared that safe drinking water and sanitation was a human right. This map I'm holding up is from the regulatory impact statement. You can see that the map is of places that have drinking water notices in New Zealand. These are the temporary ones and these are the permanent ones. And so as an Aucklander while Auckland looks relatively good I travel all around this country and I am exposed to this risk as are my children and my whānau. So it's incredibly important that we get it right because this has to be a country where we know that the water will be safe to drink and there won't be the issues that there have been which tragically affected people who were in Hawke's Bay and Havelock North. That was the beginning of this process because what had happened was that a lot of the councils had just not had sufficient funding and so they weren't able to make sure that the water supplies and the sewerage systems were all right.Now in the floods in Auckland I saw the danger of that in my own community where the water overflowed from the pipes infrastructure etc. because that's the nature of the pipes in that area. So even in Auckland which is better than most places in the country I saw the risk. I saw people swimming in the floodwaters and I was worried about the quality of what they were swimming in because it would have mixed with sewage.So that's our reality; that's what we have to fix. While there are a lot of distractions this has been a very good learning process where submissions have been taken into account and this third bill takes the number of entities up so that there is a happy compromise between people. And we have done something here that will be significant for the country as the bill seeks to make sure that water is quality in all its aspects throughout this country and safe to drink. Thank you. I commend the bill to the House.
Chen NaisiNAISI CHEN (Labour): Thank you Madam Speaker. As I came here this morning I passed The Paddington complex in Wellington. As I remembered the story behind that whole entire development it was the fact that we could have built higher apartments instead of two-storey townhouses. But why couldn't we do it? It was because the city council did not have enough money to upgrade the infrastructure—the pipes under the ground—to support intensified housing. I think it's really important to look at the reason why we're here today. I've never thought of three waters as a sexy topic; in fact talking about probably the other types of waters apart from the blue water is probably something I would shy away from in the House. But like our Minister the Hon Kieran McAnulty has talked about this is a problem that is staring down New Zealanders and we need to make sure that we get on top of it. We don't want the tragedy of Havelock North happening again—and I want to commend my colleague here Anna Lorck who has been an absolutely amazing advocate for her area in Tukituki. If we want a first-class country if we want first-class cities we need first-class infrastructure under the ground as well. We don't see these pipes—and a lot of the time we don't know that they exist or the health that they're in but I know that if we don't invest in them we definitely feel the consequences of them.As we went through the select committee process we heard from local government bodies and we addressed some of their concerns and I want to commend the Governance and Administration Committee and our chair as well in terms of actually working constructively through some of those details—things like the commencement dates things like having proportional representation on these regional representation groups but also looking at how we can make sure that we guarantee the voices of these local entities; voices of local communities. Then we balance that with the need of balance sheet separation. It's a balance on a balance in making sure that we really actually deliver the savings in terms of our ratepayers but then also making sure that the debt structure that we have—whether it's through central government whether it's through borrowing or whether it's balance sheet separation—means that local government can use their debt targets to more efficient means or for more efficient purposes. We need to make sure that at the end of the day we deliver a package that is helping all New Zealanders to get the world-class infrastructure that they deserve so that's why I commend this bill to the House.
Salesa Jenny; Watts SimonTUESDAY 15 AUGUST 2023(continued on Wednesday 16 August 2023)WATER SERVICES ENTITIES AMENDMENT BILLIn CommitteeDebate resumed.Clauses 1 and 2 (continued)CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jenny Salesa): Members when we were debating this bill last night we were on clauses 1 and 2 which are the title and commencement clauses for this bill. Are there any members who would like to take a call?SIMON WATTS (National—North Shore): Thank you very much Madam Chair and good morning. It's good to be back again on the Water Services Entities Amendment Bill. I'm keen to get into a little bit of commentary in regards to the commencement date of this bill in clause 2. Obviously in regards to the commencement of this legislation there is a variety of timing mechanisms that are embedded within it. My concern and the question to the Minister particularly relates to the provisions that will commence before 1 July 2024. If we walk our way back and just remind ourselves—and I appreciate that for some of us that causes a little bit of stress and pressure but it is something to reflect on—1 July 2024 is the date when all of this three waters reform was meant to kick off originally and obviously post the policy bonfire and the great reset under the new leadership in the Government the time line for this as per this bill kicks that out to mid-2026. But there is a phased approach around that.Clause 2 in regards to the commencement which links to the detail around that says that some aspects particularly around the initiation around shared services will be kicking in straight after the Royal assent. So my concern here is that acknowledging that we're 51 days away from a general election and that there is significant differential in the positions around how water reform should be undertaken within this country and taking into account that there are significant amounts of money continuing to be spent—significant amounts of public money taxpayer money continuing to be spent—on reform that post-election will either continue or will cease rapidly then it would only seem sensible that actually all of the Act comes into force on 1 July 2024. I think that's reasonable because if the mandate is given to whatever Government comes through then that mandate will be clear and that is democracy. But in the context of the fact that we have still got 51 days of costs being spent on reform which under a National-led Government will cease pretty much straight away it seems a little bit ironic that we're continuing just to head in and not take into account the pragmatic nature of the time line and the issues of where we're at.So I ask the Minister to put some consideration to the commencement of this legislation. The chances of him making any modification—well I won't take a bet; I'm not a betting man. But anyway I'll give the Minister an opportunity to consider that. But other than that we'll finish it there. Thank you.
Thursday 3 August 2023 - Volume 770