Russell Deborah; Brown SimeonHon Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL (Labour): Meitaki Mr Chair. I appreciate the call. I want to follow on from an issue that my colleague Rachel Boyack canvassed in part and that is the workload on councils in terms of preparing water services delivery plans. I also want to like my colleagues in the Labour Party and in the Green Party at this stage confine my remarks to Subpart 1 of Part 2 because we do want to discuss this subpart by subpart. So we're working through Subpart 1 at this stage and it concerns itself with a number of issues but it talks about the water services delivery plans that territorial authorities must prepare; that's in clause 8 Subpart 1 sitting there. So they have to prepare these water services plans and we go through clause 11 and this is where the workload really comes on for territorial authorities because clause 11 goes through and specifies the contents of these water services delivery plans. And there's a lot in them. So if we go through sub 1 of that in (a) it's a description of the current state of the water services network; (b) description of the current services of the current levels of services; (c) a description of the areas in the district that get water services and the water services infrastructure associated with a variety of population growth and so on; to what extent water services comply with regulations. I'm going to come back to this in a minute but I just want to go through how much detail is required for the benefit of the committee and for the benefit of people watching at home so they understand the workload that is being imposed on territorial authorities. So the details of the capital and operation expenditure required to deliver services. And on it goes; there's more there's more: the financial projections for delivering water services the operating costs and revenue the projected capital expenditure—this is a lot of information—the projected borrowing as well. And still it goes on: an assessment of the current condition; lifespan and value of the networks; description of the asset management approach; description of any issues and constraints and risks. But wait there's more: the anticipated or proposed model or arrangements for delivering water services; the possibility of any joint arrangement; a description of how the revenue from and delivery of water service will be separated from the territorial authority's other functions—so that's going to be an interesting one for councils that don't particularly separate out you know a separate charge. They're going to have to do some work around that. A bit of a summary of the consultation; an explanation of what they're going to do to make sure it's financially sustainable—and we've discussed some of those issues already with the smaller territorial authorities—an implementation plan.So that's a lot of information that councils are going to be required to produce. But the bit that's really I think going to add an extraordinary workload and I really want the Minister to clarify some stuff around this is what's required in clause 11 subclause (d)(ii) and clause 11 subclause (da) and that's a phrase in both of them: anticipated future regulatory requirements". So not only are councils going to have to describe what's going on in their water services network at the moment they're going to have to find a crystal ball and have a little think about anticipated future regulatory requirements. Now that's a big ask. The Minister is asking councils to go project into the future and I think this is really problematic. For starters they are being asked to project 10 years into the future under the standard version of their water service delivery plans that are required or if they choose to develop a plan that extends for longer they might have to project at least 30 years into the future as to how long they're going to have to project what those regulatory requirements are for. So I'm just wondering where the funding for the crystal balls is coming from. But you know that's not all Mr Speaker and I'm going to seek an extension of this call because there's another aspect of this which I don't see is being canvassed in the bill and I think we need some clarification Mr Chair.So the "anticipated future regulatory requirements" with respect to what? So with respect to what? Is it with respect to water services or are councils going to have to project what regulatory requirements might be put in place due to say climate change requirements? Now in the Finance and Expenditure Committee at the moment we are working through an extensive inquiry into climate adaptation and the sort of future frameworks that Government might put in place for dealing with climate adaptation. It's a huge workload and we're anticipating that coming out of it Government will eventually be setting regulations. Is the way this bill is framed—is it asking councils to anticipate those regulations? Is it asking councils to anticipate regulations I don't know with respect to green space? Is it saying that councils have to anticipate regulations to do with import rules with customs duties for bringing in particular—Rachel Boyack: Allowing pollution into rivers perhaps?Hon Dr DEBORAH RUSSELL: Indeed oh yeah. There's all sorts of regulations that Government make. So I think we need a little bit of clarity here. This is a lot to ask of councils. They're going to have to buy the crystal balls—these anticipated future regulations—but it looks to me like they're going to have to buy a whole bowling set of them or maybe a pool table set. You know there's going to have to be a lot of crystal balls that they're going to have to use to look into the future. So I would like some clarity from the Minister about these anticipated future regulatory requirements. I'd like the Minister to sort of give some clarification. This is going to be important that it gets into the Hansard because this is going to be interpreted by lawyers and in the courts when it turns out that councils have not gazed into crystal balls correctly when they have not anticipated regulations because they couldn't know. So someone is going to go—some lawyer some court is going to be looking at the Hansard and saying "What on earth did the Parliament mean when it said 'anticipated future regulatory requirements'?". So Minister I'd like to know how good these crystal balls have to be and I'd like to know what sets of regulations they need to apply to. How well do councils have to engage with this and in respect of what?Now it's probably straightforward; it could probably be easily fixed with a little tweak that said something about anticipated future regulator requirements with respect to water services; you could probably clarify it that way. I hope that is what the Minister intends and if in fact that is what he intends perhaps we can have an amendment to that effect. But beyond that I want an understanding from the Minister as to how far into the future councils have to try to work out what regulations are going to be in place in order that they can devise these water services delivery plans. Hon SIMEON BROWN (Minister of Local Government): Thank you Mr Chair. I thank the members for their questions. I noticed there is another Amendment Paper in the name of Lan Pham No. 70 in relation to upholding the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi. The Government won't be supporting this Amendment Paper. It's not necessary to amend the bill to incorporate the Treaty or Treaty settlements. Councils will have to continue to comply with all requirements under local government legislation and existing Treaty settlements this includes requirements to consult where relevant with iwi or Māori. So that Amendment Paper is not required. In relation to—[Interruption]—oh sorry I need to use my question time voice.CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): Use your question time voice Minister.Hon SIMEON BROWN: I know how much everyone appreciates it when I'm a bit quieter.CHAIRPERSON (Teanau Tuiono): Move closer to the mike.Hon SIMEON BROWN: Well I'll try and get closer to the mike. There we are. Sorry about that.In terms of the question around workload—and I think the Hon Deborah Russell did a very good job of reading out clause 11. So I appreciate that that is now in the Hansard. But the answer there is: a lot of the answers to these questions can be found within existing long-term plan data. They can request assistance from the department. A description of current levels of service etc. are in other planning documents already. So a lot of this information already exists. The purpose of this water service delivery plan is to bring it together in a water service delivery plan to outline the council's intentions and strategy using that data as to how it's going to implement it. The department will also be providing guidance and templates and Excel models for councils to populate which will assist I'm sure greatly—and I'm sure the member will be very appreciative to hear that that excellent work that the Department of Internal Affairs is doing to assist our councils.In relation to the other part of the question around the crystal balls which she spent quite some time talking about—and she suggested if we made the anticipated future regulatory requirements relate to water services but if she just read the first part of that sentence it says "if any water services do not comply". So it already was referring to water services. So the intention here is to require councils to identify when consents of critical infrastructure may expire outside of the 10-year period or plan and to obviously look at those issues as part of these plans."