Whaitiri Meka: Environment Canterbury (Transitional Governance Arrangements) Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWhaitiri Meka: Environment Canterbury (Transitional Governance Arrangements) Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 10 March 2016. Volume:711;Page:9639. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MEKA WHAITIRI (Labour—Ikaroa-Rāwhiti): Tēnā koe Mr Assistant Speaker. E ngā mema o Te Whare nei tēnā tātou katoa. I rise proudly as Labour’s spokesperson on local government. I also rise proudly as a member of this House the New Zealand House of Representatives. We all—121 of us—journeyed to this place in a well-established well-maintained and a well-protected democratic system so if it is good enough for us as members of this House to be elected to come here then why is it not good enough for the good people of Canterbury to have their say? That is the question that I pose to this House. If it is good enough for us why is it not good enough for Canterbury people?I join in solidarity with my hard-working colleagues who are based in the Canterbury region: Dr Woods the Hon Ruth Dyson Poto Williams my own colleague Rino Tirikatene and of course Clayton Cosgrove. We are very clear in our caucus that when we discuss matters of importance to Canterbury these fine hard-working MPs will go down in history for standing up for the democratic rights of people from Canterbury. It is sad to say that the members on the other side will go down in history for removing that democratic right of the people of Canterbury to have their say and I think that is the travesty with this bill. It does not give the people of Canterbury a say. After listening to the contributors from that side of the House on why this is an important step I say it is not defensible.Canterbury as we all know has been around for a long long time and it has produced some very very amazing New Zealanders. I have got no qualms in saying that the leadership down there is more than capable of taking care of these issues and that is what goes to the heart of this bill. This bill aims to provide governance arrangements for the Canterbury Regional Council to operate during the 2016-19 local authority election period. It replaces the governance arrangements that have been in place since 2010 under the Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Act 2010. It is intended to provide for a majority of members of the council to be elected by the people of the Canterbury region and it is also to provide for some of the modified resource management processes that have operated under the Environment Canterbury (Temporary Commissioners and Improved Water Management) Act 2010 to remain available to the council in order to further progress issues relating to the management of fresh water within the Canterbury region.This bill is about irrigation and this side of the House has called it for what it is. The bill is about water and its management in Canterbury. There are differing points of interest around managing Canterbury’s water. These include those within the urban community who have intense interest in the quality of their waterways for clean drinking water and recreation along with a strong sense of identity with Canterbury’s braided rivers. Councils all over the country manage to resolve issues around contested resources. It is not the case that this cannot be done in Canterbury. The region is not unique. In 2010 the new council set itself a target of ensuring that 80 percent of our rivers in the region were safe to swim in—80 percent. At that time 74 percent of rivers fell into this category and we have heard that as of today that number has declined to 67 percent.My closing statement is about what Labour will do when we are in Government. Labour will restore local democracy and the right of communities to have their say on decisions affecting them. We believe in participatory democracy on appropriate major and strategic decisions and we believe in appropriate consultation on detailed and technical issues. We recognise that a one-size-fits-all approach is not appropriate for local government organisations and we will restore local democracy to all communities. I stand in solidarity with my colleagues. We will be opposing this bill because it removes the rights of all Canterbury people to have their say in their democracy. Kia ora tātou.