Hipkins Chris: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Hipkins Chris: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 27 November 2012. Volume:686;Page:6809. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) 
: 
 Thank you Mr Chairman. It is about time. Part 2 deals with the transitional provision relating to proposals made before this bill the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill comes into effect. I want to know whether this transitional provision applies to the secret deal to do that Nick Smith cooked up with Fran Wilde over a year ago to do with the Wellington region. Will this transitional provision apply to that? We know that Nick Smith cooked up a deal with Fran Wilde over a year ago—over a year ago—to reform local government in the Wellington area. And the provisions that have been enacted in Part 1 mean that Wellingtonians will not get a chance to have a say on it. They will not get a chance to have a say on it unless they sign a petition demanding to have a referendum. At the moment under the current law they would get a chance to have a say on that but oh no Nick Smith knows better so he decided to do away with that. The proposal that he has cooked up to reform local government in the Wellington area—he has not been upfront about it; it has not been a formal proposal—will probably not actually be covered by these transitional provisions and I think that is disgraceful. I think that is disgraceful. That is what this Government does. 
This Government does not actually have any respect for the democratic process. Nick Smith is the same Minister who when confronted with the reality that people in Christchurch did not particularly like what the Government was doing there just decided that the best way to deal with that problem was to cancel the elections—just to not have the elections. The Government did not want to know what the people of Christchurch actually thought. We heard Nicky Wagner early on in this debate talking about the importance of grassroots democracy in Christchurch yet she has said absolutely nothing about the cancellation of local government elections in Christchurch. The member for Christchurch Central has had nothing to say about the cancellation of local government elections which her constituents are very upset about. They are very upset about that and Nicky Wagner has not said one squeak in their defence—not one squeak in their defence. And then she had the audacity to lecture Parliament about the importance of grassroots democracy. 
This bill is a terrible piece of legislation. It narrows down the scope of local government. I just want to draw the Committee’s attention to one comment made at the select committee by someone whose view I respect quite a lot and that is Martin Snedden. I asked Martin Snedden at the select committee hearing what the impact of this bill would have been on the Rugby World Cup had it been in place when Rugby World Cup took place last year. I remember word for word what Martin Snedden said. He said: “A lot of New Zealanders would have had a lot less fun.” A lot of New Zealanders would have had a lot less fun. That is it—members of the National Government do not like people having fun. They hate fun in fact. They do not like it. They hate democracy. They are not interested in the views of the voting public. They command a majority in the House and that is all they need to know. They will shut down the debate when they do not like the points the Opposition is raising. They will vote to shut down the debate because they do not like it when the cold hard truth comes out about the absolutely disgraceful attitude they have shown to the democratic process in pushing this bill through. 
The people of my electorate are very concerned about this piece of legislation and I come back to Part 2 and the transitional provisions that are contained in Part 2. The reason that the people in Upper Hutt are very concerned about this is that they think their fate has already been sealed. They think the Government has already decided what it wants to do in the Wellington region and that it is just not being upfront and honest about that. The people of Upper Hutt want a say in what happens to their local government. I can tell Nick Smith who talked about his constituency that I have one of those as well. Overwhelmingly the people in Upper Hutt do not want their local government to be the subject of amalgamation. Overwhelmingly the people of Upper Hutt do not want their local government to disappear but that does not worry Nick Smith. He has already decided what he wants to see happen in the Wellington region. 
Hon Dr Nick Smith 
: What have I decided? Let me in on the secret. 
CHRIS HIPKINS 
: He has already decided and even now he is still not willing to get up on his pins and actually say what it is—actually say what the decision making is. But of course we will have to wait until he is reinstated to Cabinet before we find out what Nick Smith’s proposal for the Wellington region is. But the people of Upper Hutt whom I am proud to represent do not want to see Upper Hutt swallowed up in a Wellington super-city like the National Government does. 
They took some heart from the Prime Minister’s statement. I am paraphrasing here but he basically said the Government is not going force local government reform on the rest of New Zealand the way it did in Auckland. Yet this bill allows the Government to do exactly that. It is another promise that John Key made that he had no intention of keeping. John Key is very much the “Simon Says” Prime Minister: “Don’t pay any attention to what I’m actually doing; just listen to what I say.” Regardless of what he is actually doing he will go out there and say one thing while his Ministers in his Government will do something completely different. That is National’s approach to governing. As long as John Key can go out there and smile and wave for the crowds he thinks that his Ministers can get away with doing whatever they like. And if that means they bring legislation to the House that directly contradicts promises that John Key has made he does not really care. He is probably quite relaxed about it in fact. This bill is an anti-democratic piece of legislation that robs New Zealand citizens and residents who are subject to local authority rule in their area of their democratic rights. 
This Government ultimately has no respect for the role of local government in their local communities particularly not in Christchurch where actually the role in local government after something as big as the earthquake is vital. It is not just the city council but Environment Canterbury as well. The National Government’s approach to that is to simply cancel all democratic participation in that process and cancel the ability of the voters of Christchurch to have their say on issues to do with Environment Canterbury. Why did it do that? What was its justification? Government members were actually quite upfront about it. They were worried what the outcome of an election might be. That is not a secret agenda; they were actually quite open about that. They actually went out and said they do not trust the people of Christchurch to make the right decisions and elect the right people to Environment Canterbury so they simply cancelled the elections. 
Phil Twyford 
: They’re wanting water for their corporate dairy-farming mates. 
CHRIS HIPKINS 
: That is right. They want to protect the water for their corporate dairy-farming mates as Phil Twyford just pointed out. This Government has no respect for grassroots democracy. I want to conclude with a quote from David Shearer’s speech to the Labour Party conference last Sunday. He said that the rebuild of Christchurch should be driven from the grassroots up not the Beehive down. That is the absolutely right approach to the rebuild of Christchurch. This Government does not want a bar of that. Government members do not want to hear what the residents of Christchurch have to say and if they have to cancel an election or two to make sure they do not get a chance to have a say that is exactly what they will do. They do not want to hear the views of the people in Wellington about local government reorganisation either. If they have to change the law to deny them their right to have a say on local government reform in Wellington that is exactly what they are going to do. That is exactly what this bill does. 
This bill is an attack on local democracy. It should not be passed by this House. The people who are voting in favour of it in particular a local Wellington member by the name of Peter Dunne should be ashamed of themselves. This bill goes against so many of the things Peter Dunne tells his local citizens his local constituents that he supports. It goes against so many of the promises that he has made to local people about his respect for their views and their democratic rights. I am very very disappointed that Peter Dunne is supporting this piece of legislation. It is bad legislation and we will be voting against it.