Doocey MattMATT DOOCEY (National—Waimakariri): Thank you Madam Speaker. It is a pleasure on Thursday afternoon to rise on behalf of the National Party in opposition to the Water Services Entities Amendment Bill in its first reading. Not only do I rise on behalf of the National Party which opposes this ideological bill but I also rise on behalf of hard-working Waimakariri ratepayers who when they were asked for their feedback on whether the council should support three waters voted overwhelmingly to oppose—95 percent of ratepayers who responded opposed the Government's three waters.So the Minister in his first reading can stand in the House and say it was in good faith that he brings this bill into the House but of course he knows—and the former Minister that held the responsibility for this work reform knows—that in the first days councils were promised the ability to opt out. That's what they were promised until Official Information Act documents revealed it was an all-in. So this bill doesn't come to the House in good faith; it comes to the House in bad blood. People have been misled. This is theft by stealth. No matter how you want to package it up and amend it if it's still a dog it's a dog. That's exactly what this bill is. Can you believe it? Picture the Labour Party caucus this morning right? They've had a car crash of a week; in fact probably several weeks. Morale is low and they're thinking about the day and some backbencher who hasn't read the Order Paper pipes up and says Well at least we don't have to talk about three waters anymore." Then the Leader of the House says "Whoops we actually do. We've got to swallow this dead rat again and again and again." And they think they'll quieten this down before 14 October! I'm looking forward to getting on the hustings because the public oppose this ideological approach.Even look at the legislative process they're going through. I mean I presume because the bill has been introduced in the House that it can be under the Standing Orders but who's ever heard of bringing a bill to the House that amends not one but two bills that haven't even been passed into law yet—that are still going through the legislative process. No wonder they're called the "coalition of chaos". It's more like a circus. We are here six months into the year in 2023 to amend an Act the Water Services Entities Act that was only passed in 2022. I mean this is an absolute shambles. To be told by the Minister responsible that this is in good faith—and then we had the audacity of the Hon David Clark standing up and with a straight face and I hope we get that on the clip of Parliament TV saying the statement "Listening is important." They've spent the whole time blinkered. They know best Wellington knows best Labour knows best and here they are trying to say they've had an epiphany: listening is important. Look that's not a flippant comment because it actually has impacts on this bill. Read the regulatory impact statement. It outlines—and I quote—"Constraints on timing have limited the amount of research and analysis in the development of options. As a result of these constraints officials are continuing to work with Ministers and the sector on the impacts of the 10 entity model on transitional arrangements for local government during the establishment period." The former Minister who was responsible the Hon Nanaia Mahuta said they'd been working on this policy train for three four five years. Now we find ourselves in a position where we're passing a law that the officials haven't had time to explore the actions and the impacts and the analysis of and this is what happens. These guys went into it blinkered. They knew best and now they're paying the price for it.You'll have to get up on the hustings over the next few weeks and defend this bill. Duncan Webb's sitting there—the MP for Christchurch Central. He knows because his former campaign manager—the left-leaning Mayor of Christchurch—wrote a letter to the editor to the Christchurch Press who said that because of three waters not only was he resigning his Labour membership he would never vote for Labour again. Hon Nanaia Mahuta: Rubbish.MATT DOOCEY: And that's what it went—rubbish they say. This is how out of touch—it's actually in black and white in the newspaper. In Canterbury it went down like a cup of cold sick.So you can dress it up about how you want to make good-faith amendments but the reality is that this bill does not address the issues. Yes you can broaden it out to a representative group that will represent and give their views on the issue. The issue was never about councils not having representation; the issue was that councils wanted ownership of their ratepayer assets—that is the issue that they're overlooking. Yes you can package it up. You've gone from three to four and now to 10 but it's still not going to work and that's really concerning. They've had years at this. They've been wedded to an ideological position that they have failed to move on.What we get back today is a bill that will amend two current bills before the House and a bill that was passed only last year. So what we've got is the "back-down bill". We've got a bill that they were forced dragging their heels and kicking to change because they know that this is unpopular. They know that the public does not want this. So that's why—let's be very clear about this bill: undemocratic unworkable. National will repeal this bill. In coalition I'd like to think it will be on the first 100-day bonfire. It's very clear for voters as they go up to 14 October when they look at the two options: the National Party's led by Simon Watts Local Water Done Well which will keep local ownership of water assets or a Government that is wedded on ideology that Wellington knows best and that will ram through reform. I'm really concerned about this: what this Government will do in the next few weeks of pushing through their legislation which in fact has no mandate.I'll finally leave it to say: you can put in that we're going to have a community priority statement and you can package it up that you're going to listen to the community and that you're going to bring interest groups together but take a note of this legislation. The representative groups don't have to take that statement on board; not "must consider" but "may consider". So for all the speeches tonight that we hear from Labour—that they have listened and they have responded to the public—this bill is actually no different from where it was before. Will councils own the water assets? No. Will community views be taken into consideration? No. Has there been the removal of co-governance that's hard-baked into these reforms? No. This is the hill that this Government will die on: the hill of three waters. We will always look back at this bill that actually represented a Government that was out of touch and that thought it knew better than the people they were put in to serve."