Hamilton RyanRYAN HAMILTON (National—Hamilton East): Thank you Madam Speaker. Oh it's a shame that the Green Party member has just left because I was inspired by his Genesis—oh welcome back—DEPUTY SPEAKER: I'm glad the member didn't mention anybody's name because he can't talk about the absence of a member. RYAN HAMILTON: That's right. The Genesis that was mentioned made me inspired. I know we're not talking about title and commencement but I felt like saying Let there be light." Local Water Done Well—it's such a good name it's refreshing. Or perhaps we could call this "Part 2 of the Holy Water Trilogy". Another member mentioned earlier the appropriation without compensation. Obviously this is very much compensating with appropriation but it was interesting that three waters was nicknamed "Appropriation Without Compensation". Perhaps it was a glass half empty? We could call it a glass half full or perhaps two-thirds full being that this is two-thirds of the way through this bill. It's interesting that just for a little bit of context when we think back about three waters for some context we were talking about entity A and entity B which had 24 councils in it. I mentioned that Hamilton City Council had $2 billion worth of assets and another council had $50 million worth of assets—a 40 times - scale comparison—and yet they each had one vote. So I don't know quite where the equity fell into that piece of legislation. It was quite ironic. The previous Government talked about harmonisation and that was the way that they did it. They averaged out the cost across those that could and those that couldn't. The Local Government New Zealand submission was very interesting and I looked at that. They called it geographic averaging. I don't know whether we could call it that—local government socialism would be another way to look at it—but they called it geographic averaging. If I quote from their submission they said "Councils have expressed concern that geographic averaging of water services charges may create new inequities. For example should residential consumers in a metropolitan area (who benefit from the cost efficiencies gained by operating at scale in a defined location) share in the … higher costs involved in delivering a similar level of service to rural and provincial residential customers?" So even they challenged that very thing. But really it doesn't have to be that complex. It's about simple things like being collaborative. If you need help we can provide it. The Minister has kindly offered the Department of Internal Affairs' assistance in guiding councils should they require that. Be financially sustainable further augmented by ring-fencing for greater transparency—and again the member that just spoke has left the room. But they talked about how rates are going to go up and said that we don't have a solution for it and yet we've approved the model in Auckland where they were proposing a 26 percent rates increase and we've got it down to a 7 percent rates increase. What was the manipulation we used? It's called debt-to-revenue ratio and we've incorporated it in this new legislation. It's a 500 percent debt-to-revenue ratio which means—to her other point—you can borrow more over a greater period of time which reflects the intergenerational asset value and it's shared over a greater period of time. It's not rocket science; it's a bit like a mortgage. You take it out over a long period of time. Rather than trying to fit it into councils' 10-year plans we'd take it out over a 30-year plan which is not too dissimilar to what we're trying to do with infrastructure funding and financing to get infrastructure away in this country. It's not rocket science but we're on to it. Let's talk about the Better Off funding. Another previous speaker that came and has now left the room—I don't know where they're all going. But Better Off funding: the previous Government said that no council would be worse off—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Don't keep referring to the people that are not here. There's still plenty of people here. Carry on. RYAN HAMILTON: They're all leaving. They're all leaving and I've got something really special for them. But the previous Government said that no council would be worse off—Better Off funding—but they didn't constrain councils to spend it on water infrastructure. It was a slush fund and it went to all sorts of things and you can have a look on the website and look at the Crown infrastructure's deployment of that. But none the less Madam Speaker I want to end on a high because I'm quite inspired by this transitory bill. So I've created a little poem and I hope you'll approve: Stop collaborate and listen get it right so that your river glistens. Three waters—does that ring a bell? Shiver!Better now as Local Water Done Well. The community spoke and flatly refused"There's a better way for unwanted poos."Entity A and entity BLocals said "Just leave it to me."It's about infrastructure compliance not pushing ahead in total defiance. Localism—let communities chooseThe Government hears all your views. So Madam Speaker now I sayI commend this bill; it's on its way."