Dean Jacqui: South Taranaki District Council (Cold Creek Rural Water Supply) Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Dean Jacqui: South Taranaki District Council (Cold Creek Rural Water Supply) Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 05 December 2012. Volume:686;Page:7179. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki) 
: 
 I am very happy to speak on the South Taranaki District Council (Cold Creek Rural Water Supply) Bill in its second reading. Also as other members have done I want to congratulate the local member Chester Borrows on not only bringing this bill to the House on behalf of his local authority and local ratepaying constituents but also for appearing before the Local Government and Environment Committee on several occasions to make some pragmatic and practical explanation of questions that were raised during the course of the select committee’s consideration. Nicky Wagner as usual is doing a wonderful job— 
Andrew Williams 
: Here comes the self-admiration club again. 
JACQUI DEAN 
: —in chairing this select committee. It is not easy actually for the chair of the Local Government and Environment Committee to put up with the likes of some of the members on it who are— 
Maggie Barry 
: Always fighting amongst themselves. 
JACQUI DEAN 
: —always fighting amongst themselves and the reasons seem to be far far away from some of their consideration. 
I just want to pick up the point that the previous Green speaker Eugenie Sage noted towards the end of her speech about a referendum not being held over the whole of the South Taranaki District Council area—nor should it be. Rates for rural water schemes are not collected from the whole of the South Taranaki District Council area. The rates when the scheme was rated were collected over the area of benefit accrued to those— 
Andrew Little 
: The member doesn’t know what she’s talking about. 
JACQUI DEAN 
: Yes the member does know what she is talking about. Under the rating legislation for rural water schemes they are rated across the area of benefit. So it is just and it is the right thing to do that when there is a referendum that it is done over the area that is affected by the rural water scheme. 
The area that I have the privilege of representing Waitaki is absolutely peppered by rural water schemes. Some of them came about actually as a result of farmers utilising the Chinese water races which are an amazing network that is still standing today. The water races of course were used in the business of getting gold and sluicing for gold. They were so well constructed—they could teach us a thing or two about water races—that they are still now being used in some of the water schemes around Central Otago. 
Around North Otago groups of farmers as with the group of farmers that this bill relates to got together many years ago—sometimes over a hundred years ago—and decided that they were better off working together to get a supply of water from say the Waiariki Creek or the Kakanui River. So they formed a committee back in the day they dug the trenches by hand and they laid pipes by hand. One of the things they did not do was asset management plans because they were not required back in the day so a number of councils around New Zealand have spent considerable time trying to find out just where those pipes go. The old-timers know because they were the ones who put them in or their fathers or their grandfathers put them in and they helped so they know where they were. 
I remember when we lived out in the country. We were on the western rural water scheme. Not only did we have slaters in our water and occasions when the water would also run out—which was irritating as a young mother—but also when there was a leak Whitestone Contracting the local company would have to come out and spend days trying to find just where that leak was. That would be a charge upon the farmers and consumers such as ourselves so councils brought asset management plans into being and I think that was a pretty good move. 
Now we know more about rural water schemes. They have a really rich history in New Zealand. Just as in my region the farmers who took water from the Cold Creek community water supply scheme did the same thing. They decided that it was to their benefit and that it would be far more efficient for the 162-odd families to work together for a rural water scheme. They were the beneficiaries of a Government scheme at the time that was a dollar-for-dollar subsidy. Well good on them. Good on them for forming a committee having the wherewithal to decide that they needed to deal with their water issues and for applying for and getting a dollar-for-dollar subsidy. Hallelujah! I think that is fantastic. 
What puzzles me occasionally about the response particularly of Labour and the Greens to the fact that this rural water supply is now going to go into the ownership of the farmers is that they seem to object very strongly to public money then going to the benefit of the private operators. But then I think to myself about Labour’s failed housing policy that they release and release in the hope that anybody will take any notice which they do not. The numbers are tragically all wrong but that is par for the course. Labour is happy to subsidise people into houses but it is not happy for Government money and a subsidy to go into a rural water scheme. 
I can only conclude from that that Labour and the Greens hate farmers. It is a theme that underpins a lot of the philosophy of the Labour Party and the Greens. They simply cannot conceive of the fact that farmers are underpinning the absolute economic wealth of this country. They cannot accept that. Philosophically the Greens and Labour cannot accept that the ownership of the Cold Creek community water supply could possibly go into private hands. Well I can. I think it is a good thing. I think those farmers should be commended for this work and for bringing this bill to the House. I think the South Taranaki District Council should also be commended for understanding and recognising that a local company running a rural water scheme is actually going to do a better job than a council. It is well understood particularly in my area that local control of a rural water scheme means you get local good sense and that local good sense can save money for those ratepayers and has everything to recommend it. Thank you.