Robertson Grant: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Robertson Grant: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 15 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6747. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Leader—Labour) 
: 
 There was some controversy earlier in the process of the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill about what was in and what was not in if the four well-beings were out. What could local government do? John Key was asked a number of questions about it and he said that the Hamilton V8 Supercars were out. That was not good enough. That was out. But surprisingly he said that the Ellerslie Flower Show was in. We can now reveal that Maggie Barry finally has an achievement in politics. The Ellerslie Flower Show was in because Maggie Barry lobbied for it. That was it. Her career is complete because that is the greatest contribution that we will get from Maggie Barry in this debate. 
From time to time in this House National Party members bellow across to us that we are the party of big government—that we are the party that wants everything to happen in Wellington. This is what happens. Maggie Barry occasionally raises that issue that it is big government on this side of the House. Well all I have seen from National members when it comes to looking at local government is their desire to take control away from local communities and drag it back to them here in Wellington. As Phil Twyford said every year since we have been MPs in this House this National Government has said: “We’re going to take power off local communities drag it back into Wellington and be big government over there.” 
There is no better example of that than this Government’s cancelling of the elections for the Canterbury Regional Council or Environment Canterbury and then for it to come back and extend that out—to say that the people of Canterbury will have no say over their representation at a regional council level until at least 2016. That went against the advice of officials it went against the advice of the commissioners themselves and it went against the will and interests of the Canterbury people. But that is the kind of big government that that party over there thinks is the right thing to do: to centralise that power and take it off local government. We saw it with Auckland we have seen it with Canterbury and now in this bill we see it again. 
Let us be absolutely clear. If we want one specific example of whether this Government actually believes that local residents should have a say over their own communities how is it right to take away the right to an automatic referendum where there is amalgamation? That is what this bill does. It says that the National Government knows best. The National Government knows best and local people do not have a right to an automatic referendum if there is to be an amalgamation. That is taking away democratic rights. That is the pattern of this Government and that is what this bill does. 
Other colleagues have talked about the importance of the four well-beings and I just want to highlight some of the activity of local government that this Government could take a look at. The work that the Mayors Taskforce for Jobs has done over a number of years has done far more for growth and employment far more for opportunities for young people than any of those members over there will ever be able to claim credit for. Mayors like Dale Williams and Bryan Cadogan down in Clutha district have actually got in there in their communities. These are people who I think I would say are soft Tories. That is a nice term; it is a term of endearment. Local government has a lot of people who are supporters of the National Party in it and this Government comes to this House today with this tawdry bill to trash those people—people like Dale Williams like Bryan Cadogan—who have done the work to get people in their communities into jobs and to get young people into training. Yet this Government says: “We’re better at that. We’re better at that; that’s not what local government should do.” Well actually the Government is not—7.3 percent of this country’s workers are unemployed. There are 175000 people out of work and looking for jobs. This Government has got no idea of how to make sure that there is employment growth yet it comes to this House with a bill that says: “We’re going to take away the four well-beings. We don’t think local government should be responsible for economic social cultural and environmental well-beings.” That is shameful. 
Most of the submitters on this bill came to the Local Government and Environment Committee and asked: “What are you doing removing those four well-beings? What are you doing taking away from councils the ability to deliver to their communities the services that their communities want?”. No National knows best. The National Party era of Wellington-based big government is alive and well as it takes away the rights of New Zealanders at the local level. 
It has been said by other speakers in this debate before that this bill is based on a lie. This bill is based on a lie. My colleague Annette King saw that because she saw that the statistics that Nick Smith put up alongside his  
Better Local Government 
 paper were wrong. They were shonky. They were not accurate and all of a sudden they disappeared. Annette King wrote to David Carter and asked what was going on there. David Carter wrote back to Annette King and this is what he said to her: “You note that the Department has removed the tables from its website. As noted on the website this was because there were issues with the data”—issues with the data—“both in terms of its accuracy and in terms of the picture that was being given for some councils.” 
I will translate for the members. The “issues with the data” were that it was wrong. It was a lie. It was wrong and that is the fundamental basis for this bill—perpetuating a lie about what local government has been doing. So not only does this bill take away from local communities the ability to decide what they will do but also it is fundamentally based on a lie. It is fundamentally based on undermining the ability of local communities to decide what they do. 
I want to return to the question of amalgamations and the role of local communities in what happens in amalgamations. In the community I live in in Wellington there is enthusiasm in some quarters to create some kind of larger super-city - type structure. That debate is worth having but what is wrong is that when the Local Government Commission under the provisions of this bill decides on some kind of amalgamation process the people of this region will have 40 working days to try to get 48000 signatures to actually have a referendum on a proposal—to actually have the right to have a say. That is an unacceptable limit on the rights of local people to decide how they are governed and there is not much that is more fundamental in our community than local people being able to decide how they govern their communities. 
Once again the National Party comes to this House and says: “We know better than local communities. We will control how those amalgamations take place.” and the notion that there will not be forced amalgamations—a commitment made by John Key—is thoroughly undermined by the provisions of this bill. The agenda for local government that is being driven by National is one of greater central control and I do believe that it is looking towards forced amalgamations. 
Throughout the community people have looked at this bill and said that it is wrong. It is not just the mayors as some of the members opposite would say. It is local communities which know and respect their councils but it is also fair-minded people who look at this and ask how it is fair: Christine Cheyne who said that this would be an ad hoc and fragmented arrangement; Rod Oram writing in the  
Sunday Star-Times 
 saying that it was wrong-headed illogical and based on “gross distortions of the truth” and “a handful of egregious examples”. That is the basis for making law that will define how local communities are organised and governed in the future in New Zealand—on the basis of illogical wrong-headed arguments and gross distortions of the truth. 
This bill is disrespectful to this Parliament and it is disrespectful to the people and communities of New Zealand. It takes an approach that is arrogant that is undemocratic and that gives the lie to the belief that New Zealanders would have that they have control over how they are represented. This Government is showing no respect for democracy at a local level throughout New Zealand. National is the party of big government and control when it comes to how New Zealanders are governed at a local level. This is a shameful bill and it should not pass.