Kedgley Sue: Local Government (Auckland Reorganisation) Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Kedgley Sue: Local Government (Auckland Reorganisation) Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:654;Page:3689] 
SUE KEDGLEY (Green) 
: 
 I certainly want to speak on this important amendment new Part 12. But before I do I say how thrilled I am that people in Wellington have taken the time to come to Parliament to listen to this debate. That means that we in Wellington are well-prepared for when our turn comes as it most certainly will once the Local Government (Auckland Reorganisation) Bill has been foisted on the people of Auckland. The Government will then turn its attention to other parts of New Zealand and Wellington will be one of those parts. So it is great to see everyone here. We will be up with the play and aware of what is happening. Already there are calls from the Mayor of Wellington and others for a similar sort of forced amalgamation here in Wellington. So I thank those people very much for coming out today. 
The other thing I want to do is table ACT’s policy on local government. The National Party has asked us to give it proof that a privatisation agenda is lurking beneath this bill. Here is the proof positive. Everyone can read it for themselves: “Local government will be required to shed its commercial activity … Roads and piped water will be supplied on a fully commercial basis.” etc. I would like to table that policy so everyone can be quite clear as to why we have the suspicion that the ACT agenda is to privatise the $28 billion of assets in Auckland. People can read it for themselves. 
The other thing I take issue with is some of Gerry Brownlee’s comments. He said that nothing in this bill can override any other bill. In fact the reason we are here today is that the bill overrides the provisions of the Local Government Act 2002 that stipulate that there should be a formal consultation and a poll of electors in any part of New Zealand where a reorganisation takes place. This bill has overridden the right of Aucklanders to have a poll in order to make a decision about whether they want to see their eight councils obliterated and whether they want this new highly centralised Auckland Council to be foisted upon them. This bill overrides the other bills. I do not know why Mr Gerry Brownlee suggested that it could not override other bills because it does. 
Then he asked why we would assume that this bill would take away the right to parental leave of the women who are part of the 6300 employees in the existing councils. Well why would we not assume that the rights were going to be taken away when the bill takes away virtually everything else in Auckland governance? The bill takes away the rights of eight existing local councils to be sovereign and to implement the wishes of their electors. It effectively ties the local councils’ hands behind their backs and they will have to go cap in hand every time they want to spend more than about $5000. So why would we not assume that this bill seeks to override the rights of women employees to have paid parental leave? 
It is incredible that we are debating the issue of paid parental leave. I have actually been doing some research in between coming to the Chamber on women’s liberation. Paid parental leave was one of the things that women were calling for in 1970. Here we are in 2009 and the National Government is seeking to take away paid parental leave. It is truly alarming which is why this amendment is so critical. If the Government is not trying to take away the rights of women to paid parental leave in the transition why would it not allow this amendment for the avoidance of doubt? 
The other thing that I would like to table today is a definition of “blitzkrieg”. That is what is being done here. One of the fundamental tactics of Rogernomics is speed—do not give people a minute to breathe just keep moving and give them no time for reflection. Blitzkrieg was developed in Nazi Germany. Major General Fuller defined blitzkrieg as “Speed and still more speed and always speed was the secret … and that demanded audacity more audacity and always audacity.”