Goldsmith Paul: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Goldsmith Paul: Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Sitting date: 29 November 2012. Volume:686;Page:6974. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
PAUL GOLDSMITH (National) 
: 
 It is my pleasure to speak on the third reading of the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill which is all about showing that local government like central government needs to deliver better services to New Zealanders within tight financial constraints. These Better Local Government reforms provide clarity around the role of councils strong governance improved efficiency and more responsible financial arrangement. 
A lot of the debate has been around these mysterious four well-beings and I sat through a very large number of submissions on these through the select committee process. I remember them well. There were a lot of submissions as has been said from mayors and councillors saying: “There is no problem. No need for change. Local government should continue to be free to promote social economic environmental and cultural well-beings. No problem here look the other way.” We also heard a lot of scaremongering about a great list of things that local government has been doing for decades well before 10 years ago when these four well-beings materialised and that somehow they would not be able to do those. Well they did them in the 1960s and 1970s so why would they not be able to do them now? 
But we heard some very different stories from the ratepayers’ associations. I remember very well a little old lady from Howick who came along and wept in front of the select committee— 
Dr Cam Calder 
: Wept? 
PAUL GOLDSMITH 
: —wept she did—because her rates had been going up skyrocketing over the last few years. She is on a fixed income like many people. She had lived in the house that her husband had built after the War. She did not have extra money to keep on paying 10 percent more a year because Len Brown had chosen to distribute the rates in such a way as to see her rates going up by 10 percent. She was at her wit’s end and that is what this Government is about doing. That is why I am so focused on restraining local government spending. Of course before anything can be spent it must first be taken from people’s pockets unwillingly. 
The point about the four well-beings as stated in the 2002 Act is that they do not just allow councils to get into every activity under the sun; it is more than that. It is that councils have to promote the four well-beings. I have been a councillor on Auckland City Council and I have seen how it works. It is not just an invitation to do these things; it is an incitement. It is an instruction to broaden the gaze of local government into a whole lot of new areas—mostly areas that have been dealt with by central government already. That is why rates have gone up well beyond the rate of inflation over the past 10 years since these well-beings were introduced it is why debt has quadrupled and it is why if unchanged rates will continue to rise. Bringing in this bill is an important way to stop the gusher that we have seen in local government spending over the past 10 years and I commend it to the House. Thank you.