Dalziel Lianne: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — In Committee 
Dalziel Lianne: Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:661;Page:10001] 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I rise to speak to Part 2 “Replacement of governing body of ECan”. I am rather concerned about the way the Government has referred to some of its own actions in the past—or some of our actions in the past—without mentioning the most obvious one. 
Part 2 goes through the technical details of the replacement of Environment Canterbury. I will talk about the amount of notice essentially that people are being given in respect of what is happening with their roles. We got about a month’s notice to the elected members of Environment Canterbury which reminds me of the approach that an earlier National Government took when it sacked overnight every member of every area health board during the urgency that followed the Budget that even the then Minister of Finance described as the “mother of all Budgets”. I was in Parliament at that time and I recall the debate incredibly clearly because I knew people who were on area health boards across the political spectrum from a range of different political backgrounds. Many of them had budgeted for the fact that they were undertaking that work as elected members of the area health board. They had no idea that this was going to happen and as a result a number of people had resigned permanent positions and full-time jobs in order to devote their energy and attention to their work on the area health board. Then completely out of the blue they were all sacked. 
There was the rather strange situation where the Government of the day and the Hon Simon Upton—I remember this as if it were yesterday because I feel a sense of déjà vu with what is happening here—at the same time as the 1991 Budget released a green and white paper on health that signalled the most radical reform in health this country had ever seen. Before the consultation had even begun National had decided that elected members would have no part in the future of New Zealand’s health system. 
It is a bit ironic really—we are not allowed to use other words in this Chamber—that we heard the Minister in the chair the Hon Nick Smith ask the Hon Ruth Dyson and myself where we were when Helen Clark sacked the Auckland Area Health Board. We said that we were not in Parliament. He said that it was not relevant because anything that happened before one arrived in this Parliament did not count. He asked us where we were. Well we were not here so I do not know what sort of answer he expected to elicit from that response. He was not in Parliament either because he was elected the same year I was and probably recalls these debates very very clearly as well. That was the longest period of time that Parliament had been in urgency. In fact we were called back the following Monday and it was the first time since the Second World War that Parliament had sat on a Monday. So we have had this situation before. 
How is this relevant to Part 2? I refer members to clause 9 “Elected members cease to hold office on close of day before replacement day”. It states that “(1) On the close of the day before the replacement day the elected members of ECan then holding office (the ‘elected members’) cease to hold office. (2) This section applies no matter what the Local Electoral Act 2001 or the Local Government Act 2002 may say. (3) An elected member is not entitled to any compensation or other payment or benefit for the loss of office.” That is pretty much exactly the clause that went into the health amendments that came around during the course of the urgency debate after the 1991 Budget was presented to Parliament. An elected member’s not being entitled to any compensation or other payment or benefit for the loss of office caused problems from one end of the country to the other. People had relied on having an income from the role they had been playing on their district health board. I am not sure of the circumstances of the individual members of Environment Canterbury but to get 1 month’s notice that the position they have been democratically elected to hold is being cancelled cannot be anything other than a breach of natural justice. It is important that we debate these issues because people’s interests are being affected by the way this legislation is being worked through. 
We come to the question of timing. What timing does this bill sets out? It states: “The responsible Ministers”—well “The irresponsible Ministers” might have been a good amendment for that clause—“must determine the replacement day and give notice of it—(a) in the  
Gazette 
; and (b) to the elected members of ECan.” We heard from the Minister yesterday that we are looking at 1 May for the replacement day. That is kind of an ironic day because of course it is International Workers’ Day. Although these people are not employees of Environment Canterbury in any way shape or form they might have made commitments based on the income they have been receiving. That does not seem to faze the Minister whatsoever. In fact as I understand it the Government will pay the commissioners significantly more than Environment Canterbury councillors are being paid because they will be employed on a commission as opposed to being elected to represent the democratic interests of the Canterbury region. 
I will also talk about the timing in terms of how long this measure lasts for. The 2010 election for members of Environment Canterbury is deferred by clause 22 and members of Environment Canterbury elected at the next election come into office on the resumption day. The resumption day—that was the word I was looking for—relates to the period at which this measure is overturned or the 2013 election of local bodies whichever comes first. The problem is that I suspect the reason for this time frame is that the Government has decided to defer the decision it has already made to cancel regional government in Canterbury and I personally believe to cancel regional Government across New Zealand as we saw with the super-city in Auckland. This is really a forerunner to what is about to happen right across the country. 
The Government does not want that to be an election issue next year for the general election and I believe that is why this particular process has been chosen. If we honestly took this bill out to a broad consultative process that included this bill’s going to a select committee those councillors who put themselves up for election could have their say. Whether I agree with their politics or not I admire people who are prepared to put themselves forward for some of these roles. Sometimes performing a role for Environment Canterbury can be a bit of a thankless task. It has a reputation—a lot of anecdote has driven the report as I have already referred to once in this Chamber—and that makes it hard for people to take on these particular roles. In this particular case the Government has not allowed those people to have a public say. They should be able to be held to account within their own constituencies. A select committee should be meeting down in Canterbury now and travelling throughout the region letting those who stood for election and who were successful in that regard have their say about what has really gone on in this particular case. Maybe the individual councils could be asked to debate the issues as councils rather than the mayors and chief executives being the only ones who are entitled to express an opinion in respect of what is appropriate in terms of our regional democracy. 
That is what I keep coming back to. I honestly believe that the Government has deliberately made this decision at this time. It has used the urgency motion cloaked the bill in secrecy up until this point and simply allowed for a ramming through of a process that destroys regional democracy in the Canterbury region. I believe that this is a promise of things to come and that this Government has made a decision. Unfortunately the Minister of Local Government has not yet taken a call on this bill today. I am hoping that he will get up and take a call on it because it is vitally important to democracy in New Zealand.