Bridges SimonHon SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga): I want to run through this I think. I won't run through every particular section or subsection from 19ZA to 19ZG that's been repealed; suffice it to say there's 14. I have to agree with one thing the Minister in the chair has said and that is that they set up a process to do away with the referendum that was in place and set up through the law under the Clark administration. And they are as that Minister in the chair said the guts of this bill.I do though want to make some general comments that apply with specificity to all of those 14 provisions and how they operate as a whole in doing away with the set-up from the old law of the referendum or the poll. The first one is this: those provisions operate together retrospectively and that is an incredibly important principle—or rather lack of it—in these parts the guts of the bill in terms of what by their effect and their nature they are doing.You know there's two things to say here about the retrospectivity of 19ZA to 19ZG. Firstly in theory that offends the rule of law. It offends against the principles this House should work under. Ministers and Governments should bring legislation to this House and the reason for that to cut to the chase is very simple: people plan their lives and the way they do things—in this case the way they go about their democratic rights—on the basis of what the law is and therefore will continue to be for some time until it is changed prospectively. These provisions by their very nature in setting up the process for getting rid of the referenda or poll retrospectively offend against that.Then of course there's the points around that particular practice as it is practically worked out and the reason why it's such a problem. I said just before that the reason it is a problem is because of what it means as people can't go out planning their life and their ordering of their democratic rights. What it means quite practically here is I think Dr Smith the answer is seven areas that have gone forward—collected signatures and the like—and gone out; they've set up their stall in good faith because that was a law and still is actually—we're in the process of passing this bill. You know they did it rain sunshine or hail—they did all of that and then the rug has been pulled out from underneath them. Actually that affects about 1 million ratepayers—these very provisions and their retrospective application—Barbara Kuriger: How many?Hon SIMON BRIDGES: About a million—about a million ratepayers across those seven council rohe if you like.So that's a real point that I want to raise about these 14 provisions. The second point that I wanted to make though is that they are by their nature again in general across the 14 provisions that get rid of the referenda a gerrymandering—I would argue an illegitimate quite secretive really gerrymandering of local government laws. And why do I say that? Well I say that because we have a position where every other referendum that can be held in local government on any subject area that you like to—not the Chair but that anyone would like to mention whether it's dog control whether it's recycling whether it's climate change policy or a ward—you name it they can be subject to a binding referendum but here in these clauses we are doing away with the mechanics of that and the point could be made we can have a non-binding referendum. The problem with that is—the second point around this gerrymandering as I would call it is the point that Dr Smith was teasing out with the Minister and I think in the end we got an answer—well you can have a process for doing away with a Māori ward but by the way it's going to be in a minimum of six years from the next election.And talk about—well I come back to it—gerrymandering. I mean that is very cynical it seems to me.