Salesa Jenny; Boyack RachelLocal GovernmentCHAIRPERSON (Hon Jenny Salesa): Thank you Minister. Members we now have the Minister of Local Government. The Minister is available from 4.08 until 5.08 to respond to your questions. RACHEL BOYACK (Deputy Chairperson of the Governance and Administration Committee): Thank you Madam Chair. Look it's a pleasure to kick off the debate on the Estimates for Vote Internal Affairs and specifically looking at local government as deputy chair of the Governance and Administration Committee. I just note that our committee is small but mighty and I look forward to some excellent contributions from all sides of the committee of the whole House this evening regarding the work that we've been doing to examine the Estimates for the Budget. So I just note that there are rather a number of ministerial roles and allocations within this particular vote including some that are very relevant to local government but also others that have other interests that will be covered off at various points in this debate including the digital economy and communications; diversity inclusion and ethnic communities; and the ministry for racing—so the very important work of this committee. But look I'm going to focus my contribution—particularly because we have the Minister of Local Government here—with regard to some of the future work within the local government space and I just note there is a significant amount of change occurring within local government. That change is critical to ensure that our local government is set up for communities. I do want to indulge just for a moment and say that we've seen in my electorate of Nelson in the last week just how critical the role of local government is in our communities when we have the significant events like we've had. I just want to acknowledge the work of the Nelson mayor Rachel Reese; the Tasman mayor Tim King; and all of the staff from Nelson City Council and Tasman District Council who have been doing an outstanding job and our neighbours across in Marlborough also have been facing a very challenging situation. We heard from the Minister and had a lot of discussion around the three waters reform. There were some specific discussions that I think would be really useful to hear about from the Minister around the better-off funding and how that will be released over the coming months and around time frames. One of the questions that came up during the Estimates hearing was around the transition—particularly around the use of technology—and I think that would probably be an area that the members of the committee of the whole House here may well find useful to hear about from the Minister. One of the areas we examined was the review into the future for local government and I just want to note that this is actually a critical part of the work for local government going forward. We know that many of our councils are facing constrained funding environments they're facing increased complexity in the work that they're doing and they're looking at how they can continue to be connecting with their communities as well as making the necessary investment in infrastructure that's so important for housing for adaptation around climate change and for all of that work so that we are continuing to get the right people sitting around our council tables and so that councils are enabled to be able to do the work that they need to do with their communities. I just also want to note that partnership between central government and local government which is so critical and this is one of the areas that we spoke about. Again we've just seen that in the last week in my electorate—that critical relationship of the National Emergency Management Agency at the centre alongside local government to respond to the events that we've had. Just a final note—before I hope that we'll be able to hear from the Minister—around the importance of Māori representation in local government and what plans may be going forward. We're about to have elections where a number of our councils across the rohe have included Māori wards. If the Minister has got any plans around work to enable councils to bring our Māori voices to the table and also that work in partnership between our councils and iwi—any progress around that particular issue. So we've had a detailed examination of the Estimates at select committee and I look forward to the debate and look forward to hearing from the Minister. Thank you.