Hobbs Marian: Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation)  Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Hobbs Marian: Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation)  Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:617;Page:13080] 
Hon MARIAN HOBBS (Minister for the Environment) 
: 
 I move  
That the Wellington City Council (Te Aro Reclamation) Amendment Bill be now read a second time 
. The bill has been reported back from the Local Government and Environment Committee with an amendment that I am advised is accepted by the Wellington City Council. I thank the members of the select committee for their careful consideration of the bill. 
This is a small bill of just four clauses dealing with a 1500 square metre piece of reclaimed land known as Jack Ilottt Green which is on the corner of Harris Street and Jervois Quay. It was once home to Wellington’s Circa theatre and is a very much-loved corner not quite on the waterfront but just across the road from it. The site is the last remaining piece of land covered by the Te Aro Reclamation Act. Wellington always seems to be handling these fairly ancient Acts. 
This Act required the council to sell or lease the land by public auction after at least 2 months’ notice and to use the proceeds to repay borrowings for the reclamation. That sounds familiar except it is 100 years old. The council can sell or lease other landholdings not subject to the Te Aro Reclamation Act without a notified public auction. The bill before the House today seeks to remove constraints and allow the council to deal freely with the land in question. 
I have sponsored this bill as I sponsor many local bills because I do not believe that central government legislation particularly that passed a long time ago should unnecessarily hamper how local authorities deal with land under their control. I note that a member of this House a former member of the Wellington City Council issued a press release in which she said that this legislation was thought up “sneakily” by the city council. There is nothing sneaky about legislation that is put on the Order Paper and is on the Internet for everyone to see. There was nothing sneaky about this legislation. 
I met with people who were nervous about what might happen to Jack Ilottt Green and I pointed out to them that under the existing legislation the land could have gone to auction and no one would have had any control of what happened to it if it went to auction. This way there is some community control. 
Some submitters to the select committee—I think they were the same ones who came to see me—were concerned that the bill could remove the council’s obligation to follow the decision-making requirements of the Local Government Act. The select committee agreed that clause 4 of the bill as introduced was unnecessarily broad in the discretion it gave to the council. The committee recommended that the council deal with the land in accordance with the Local Government Act. I have no reason to believe that the local council intended to do anything other than work under the Local Government Act the Resource Management Act and district plans. However that amendment will maintain the intent of the bill by removing specific constraints on the council while ensuring that any sale be publicly notified and the community be consulted. So I welcome the change. 
I am aware of some of the very exciting developments involving that land that are being considered by Wellington city councillors. I look forward to them involving the community in their thinking about those developments. I encourage everyone with an interest to engage with the council so that the best solution is reached for that land. 
Again I refer to a press release by Sue Kedgley a member of the Green Party in which she thunders that this will be an election issue. I would hope that we were not into antagonism yet again in Wellington but that we were about working constructively together. In this case it is central government working with local government to remove an obdurate way of working but I hope in the future that all of the Wellington community will work together rather than set up for a pitched battle yet again. Too much time and effort has been lost in this community by pitched battles. It would be good if we could work together under the Local Government Act. 
The Wellington City Council has advised that it accepts the change to the bill and I commend it to the House.