Court SimonSIMON COURT (ACT): Thank you Mr Speaker. The ACT Party will not be supporting the Water Services Entities Bill. In fact should ACT form part of a future Government then we will work to repeal the bill and replace it with ACT's water infrastructure plan. That's a plan that I consulted on with 67 councils before developing the plan and drew on the knowledge and experience of organisations who deliver water services who build water infrastructure and who manage the environmental impacts of discharges to water.Now it turns out that it's a very very simple fix to fix the three waters problems which are drinking water not fit for human consumption in some places at some times around New Zealand particularly in smaller communities where their water supplies are vulnerable to flooding and vulnerable to damage; and waste-water treatment plants unable to keep up with the growth that New Zealand's experienced while our population's grown from 3 million or so since 1990 to over 5 million now. If you look at projections from Canterbury from Auckland and from the Wellington region we're heading for a population of 6 to 7 million people by 2050 and that's one of the reasons why we need to build the infrastructure and upgrade the waste-water treatment plants to deal with that growth as well as all the issues with the assets that haven't been adequately maintained in the past.But it is a simple fix and I'll outline it for you. Firstly you let these organisations that own the assets which are local government democratically elected councils continue to own the assets. But what you do is you provide a regulator over them that says How will you actually perform your obligations" to deliver safe drinking water and to make sure that you're not discharging waste water and sewage into your local rivers and streams to meet your environmental commitments—that's called Taumata Arowai the regulator that the Water Services Act set up and it was created last year in 2021. Now I spoke to the Taumata Arowai staff at Fieldays. They say they're on track to meet their commitments. They'll be checking up on all the local councils and their drinking-water supplies and then they're going to move on to checking up on all councils' commitments around discharges of waste water and stormwater to the receiving environment. There—tick job done regulator in place.Now we need to think about how we actually get the investment in the networks for maintenance and renewal of existing assets and for growth. What ACT would say is that there are billions of dollars in private and institutional capital looking for a home right now. It's not just this Government which blew up the Reserve Bank and started printing money and handing it out hand over fist there is so much private institutional capital—in KiwiSaver funds ACC and superannuation funds—floating around the world right now that is looking for a place to invest. It turns out that infrastructure which includes big subdivision developments waste water and stormwater networks and drinking-water treatment plants is the perfect place for long-term institutional investors to invest. They know that if they got a billion dollars and they put it into a waste-water treatment plant then the city that operates that plant will be able to pay it back over 30 or 40 years. That means that the city instead of having to come up with a billion dollars' worth of ratepayer funds to pay the contractor on the day that the waste-water treatment plant is opened can pay it off over 25 35 or 40 years. That's what they do in other countries I've recently visited like the United States and Canada but it appears in New Zealand this Government thinks that only ratepayers and taxpayers can pay for stuff. Well that's what the Minister of Local Government said.Look the ACT Party thinks that there is a problem with three waters infrastructure. It can be solved with the water regulator which already exists—that's Taumata Arowai—and if we get the funding and financing model right and let local councils retain ownership but make sure they're subject to the kind of regulation that will force them to meet their environmental and human health obligations around drinking-water quality then job done three waters reform not needed.Then I want to come to the problems with this bill and why it is not needed. Well this bill appears to be an improvised Treaty settlement dressed up as an infrastructure reform. And I want to bring the attention of the House and of New Zealanders watching this at home and listening on 882 AM that wonderful frequency that broadcasts Parliament out over the airwaves to the reasons why the ACT Party believes this is an improvised Treaty settlement dressed up as an infrastructure reform.I asked Minister Mahuta in a written question "Minister what justification is there or what special interest what special right do iwi and hapū have in three waters assets built after 1840?" And the Minister replied directly: "None above that of normal ratepayers." And yet this bill contains a number of provisions that allocate iwi and hapū those organisations special rights special privileges. Firstly co-governance of the regional representation groups—50 percent of the seats on the regional representation groups which will direct the strategy for the four water services entities. And I asked the Minister "Why is this necessary?" Well apparently these iwi and hapū have special rights and interests because of the Treaty of Waitangi and that in order to give effect to the Treaty of Waitangi they must be given these seats.Well while the Waitangi Tribunal might say that that's not necessarily the case. Parliament makes laws—Parliament makes laws—and Parliament can acknowledge decisions by courts but it makes laws that actually treat New Zealanders fairly and give them equal rights.Then I want to come to Te Mana o Te Wai. Te Mana o Te Wai means I understand "The strength of the water." It's a concept rooted in what I understand to be the spiritual connection that many people of Māori descent feel between water and themselves. That's a wonderful concept. In New Zealand we're free to practice our religious and spiritual beliefs in any way that we want. That's one of the wonderful things about living in a liberal democracy. And yet when we consider what Te Mana o Te Wai statements in the Water Services Entities Bill require it gives iwi and hapū in a region the exclusive right to submit a statement directing these new water corporations set up at the direction of Minister Nanaia Mahuta. It gives these iwi and hapū the exclusive right to say how the water will be allocated who will get it and what should happen to the water. That also now includes geothermal water resources geothermal energy resources—which power electricity power stations for example—and coastal waters. And yet no other group is afforded these rights in the community.The ACT Party says "Look there is a problem with the delivery and the operation of three waters infrastructure" in terms of providing for growth and allowing for renewal and maintenance costs but actually this bizarre attempt to improvise a Treaty settlement dressed up as an infrastructure reform is a completely flawed way to do it.What we saw a couple of weeks ago in the House with the addition of an entrenchment clause in the bill—which would apparently protect the assets in the water services corporations these new entities the Minister wants to establish from ever being privatised. And that was introduced to the House by a Green Party member supported by Minister Nanaia Mahuta who claims it was a mistake and then also claims at the same time she actually did mean to support it. That was apparently intended to protect the assets from privatisation. But what we know is that taking assets off democratically elected councils billions and billions of dollars' worth—nearly $11 billion worth in the case of Auckland's water care—and putting them in a corporation and then telling New Zealanders that future Governments won't be allowed to return those assets to democratic control isn't an attempt to stop privatisation. It's just an attempt to stop future Governments democratically elected Governments actually putting into place their own policies and agendas.That's why the entrenchment provision was repealed and again that's why the three waters reform proposed by this Government and Minister Mahuta will fail—because nobody wants it; nobody voted for it. The ACT Party will repeal it and replace it with a better policy."