Burns Brendon: General Debate 
Burns Brendon: General Debate 
[Volume:674;Page:20053] 
BRENDON BURNS (Labour—Christchurch Central) 
: 
 I am very pleased to follow the current member for New Plymouth and to tell New Plymouth that good news is coming in the form of Andrew Little. 
I turn my focus today to an issue about asset sales. As I was preparing for this speech I picked up from my desk an amendment that I put up when we were debating the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Bill 3 months ago. That amendment states: “In developing the Recovery Plan for the CBD the Christchurch City Council must not propose the full or partial sale of any assets which it or any of its subsidiaries hold.” The reason I put up that amendment was my fear that the Government may well push Christchurch City Council into selling assets to fund earthquake recovery debt. If I needed any confirmation of that fear it came yesterday in the report of the Finance and Expenditure Committee on the estimates for the finance portfolio. It stated: “As the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Act 2011 allows the sale”—allows the sale—“of Christchurch City Council assets to fund the rebuilding of the city we asked the Minister of Finance whether he could guarantee that this would not happen.” The Minister of Finance did not take up the opportunity in front of the Finance and Expenditure Committee to give an assurance to the people of Christchurch that their assets would not be sold— 
Hon Sir Roger Douglas 
: What? You don’t want it to be rebuilt? 
BRENDON BURNS 
:—as we struggle with the issue of the debt that the earthquake provided. 
I am listening to the member opposite Roger Douglas who obviously favours asset sales. I say this to him: those assets in Christchurch have generated over the last few years a huge flow of income. They have kept down the rates of Christchurch by 15 percent per annum over many years. One asset alone Orion Networks our power network company has in the last nearly 20 years delivered nearly $1 billion—$1 billion—to the ratepayers of Christchurch. That is about $1 million a week of return from one of the assets that the Christchurch City Council and its ratepayers currently own. 
I challenge members opposite from Canterbury like Kate Wilkinson and the junior Government whip to stand up and take a call in this debate or in any debate and say what their views are on whether Christchurch should be forced by this Government—because it has this philosophy—to sell its assets. We know that those comments from the Minister of Finance recorded at the Finance and Expenditure Committee took place before two events. One event was the 13 June aftershocks. The other event was when the Christchurch City Council and the Waimakariri and Selwyn district councils lost their insurance cover. That means that across those three councils is the risk of $5 billion or thereabouts of infrastructure costs. 
This Government has stood up time and time again to defend the rationale of asset sales—time and time again—in terms of Government-owned assets like our power generators. Therefore I ask this question: why would this Government when it is faced with $5.5 billion in rebuilding costs not force the hand of a reluctant Christchurch City Council to divest those assets? Again I ask members opposite like Kate Wilkinson to stand take a call and give us her view. What would she say to the people of Christchurch? Would she support the sale of their assets which have returned in the instance of one asset—one asset—alone over the last 20 years nearly $1 billion? 
Those assets include the port of Lyttelton which is currently expanding by metres a day as the rubble of Christchurch is used to refill the port. They include Christchurch International Airport where a major renovation is under way to cope with its expected and projected growth. They include Enable Networks the only metropolitan broadband network upgrade that did not go to Telecom. It is currently held by the ratepayers of Christchurch. I challenge members opposite again to tell us that they will stand and join the Labour Party and me to say that we will not accept the sale of Christchurch City Council assets because they are too important. We are facing a 7.5 percent increase in rates this year as it is and that is if you like held back by a 15 percent dividend from those assets. 
The debate having concluded the motion lapsed.