New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill

Kia ora, Madam Speaker. I move, That the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Governance and Administration Committee to consider this bill.

The New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill protects one of New Plymouth District’s key financial assets: the Perpetual Investment Fund—or as we locally call it, PIF, which I will refer to it as from now on. The protections in the bill ensure the perpetual nature of this fund continues for benefit of the New Plymouth district community into the future. This is about generational investment.

I want to acknowledge the New Plymouth District Council, particularly Mayor Neil Holdom and his team, who have brought this bill to Parliament today. I also want to acknowledge the people of the New Plymouth district, and thank those who have already engaged on this so that we can be here today in this first reading.

Now, the background of this bill shows why the council is asking that this Parliament puts in place a more sustainable legal arrangement for our PIF. The PIF was formed back in 2004—I remember it well—when the council sold off its share in Powerco. The initial value that we received was $259 million. The PIF was formed as a more diversified investment, with an active investment approach taken.

Now, the global financial crisis of 2007-2008 hit the PIF hard, as it did many other large investment funds around the world. The value of the PIF decreased. However, the council of the day was concerned about maintaining the release, and it took from the PIF to subsidise rates to avoid a large shock to ratepayers. What this meant, though, was that the PIF continued to drop in its value. It was not until 2011 that the council began a programme to reduce the release to a more sustainable level without causing too great of a shock to ratepayers of New Plymouth.

Now, the council finished its programme in 2015, and, in the following year, put in place a new governance model to a more sustainable management of the PIF. This included establishing the New Plymouth PIF Guardians Limited—get my tongue around that one—to set the investment principles around its annual release, rather than the council doing this. This insulates the PIF from direct political pressure, which is good. The council and the PIF Guardians also have a governance deed that clearly outlines their role. This governance deed is embedded through requiring a 75 percent majority vote by councillors in order to amend, terminate, or waiver it. This sets a high political threshold and requires a degree of political consensus.

As history shows, New Plymouth District Council has had some hard lessons on how to ensure that PIF is used in a sustainable manner. The council has already put in place a range of measures for this, particularly with the PIF Guardian mode and model, which follows best practice. The PIF Guardians provide well-diversified investment strategy. The release to the council each year is set at a sustainable level and has been growing slowly. This financial year, the release was $10.4 million and will reduce the average residential rates by $163. However, the balance, as of 30 June 2020, was $339 million—about $50 million below the inflation-adjusted opening balance.

While the council has done what it can to protect the PIF, the council could only go so far on its own. The council has asked this Parliament to put in place a more enduring legal arrangement that will ensure the mahi will not be undone by a short-sighted future council. To do this, the bill will ensure that the council always considers the long-term nature of the PIF whenever it makes decisions. It ensures that the council is always seeking to maintain or increase the real value of the PIF’s capital. While there is an exception provided for this, it is deliberately set high so that it only applies in things such as natural disasters or other crises, when sufficient funding may be required to rebuild the district.

Now, the bill also has the exemption, which works alongside existing protections that the council has put in place. It does not replace the 75 percent majority requirement in council’s standing orders to amend the PIF governance deed. Instead, it sets out a legal test that must meet before council can begin the process.

The bill also sets out some requirements for investment decisions that help to future embed the PIF as a long-term investment for the community. Investments need to be made independently from the elected council, just as things we have in this House—such as the Superannuation Fund and ACC investments, which are made separately, independently—so this will happen for our PIF in New Plymouth. Investment decisions will need to be made on a prudent commercial basis that maximises return without undue risks.

The council is also seeking a small exemption from the standard Local Government Act 2002 obligations so that the PIF can be invested into any listed airport or port within New Zealand without having to go through long-term plan processes. Now, this isn’t around seeking a loophole for the council to purchase assets to gain control, because, as I said moments ago, the bill requires decisions to be made independently of the elected council.

Now, the future aspect of this bill, and looking further at this bill, is that it sets in stone that the PIF is only to be used for the benefit of the New Plymouth district community as it exists today. This means that the beneficiary that benefits from the community of the PIF remains and begins as being the same community that is which contributed to its establishment all those years ago.

Now, this has been done before. An example of that is not far from home for me, in South Taranaki. They took a very similar approach back in 1999, where they created the South Taranaki District Council, had their long-term investment fund through their 1999 local Act, and therefore provides balance to the two big local government investment funds in Taranaki.

Ultimately, this bill is about assisting New Plymouth District Council to help protect its Perpetual Investment Fund from short-term thinking, which is important, and, therefore, ensuring that this fund continues to benefit the district’s community well into the future. This is a long-term plan. The bill permanently etches into the council’s legal obligations many of the principles that sit behind its current arrangements. This allows the council to change the arrangements if this Parliament changes the Local Government Act to allow new organisations to be formed and other options, while ensuring that any changes still meet the fundamental objectives of a long-term fund that looks beyond the current political issues. This is a long-term investment.

This bill is the last piece of the jigsaw puzzle to ensure that the Perpetual Investment Fund can achieve its name for the New Plymouth district community. This is a Perpetual Investment Fund. This is looking long-term. This is ensuring that ratepayers and members within the New Plymouth district have certainty and security into the future. On that, I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you very much, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise to speak on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill first reading. I want to acknowledge the member of Parliament for New Plymouth, Glen Bennett, who has brought this bill to the House on behalf of the New Plymouth District Council. National will be supporting this bill through to the select committee process.

As the member Glen Bennett has noted, I also want to recognise Mayor Neil Holdom for his contribution, along with his deputy mayor and councillors in regards to this process. What we are dealing with here is a bill and a local bill that, in effect, provides additional protections to protect a capital fund that results from the sale of Powerco, a power entity, by this community in the past. This perpetual fund has grown in size from around $249 million to now in the region of $346 million. And that fund provides revenue which is used to mitigate the costs that are incurred by that local council and, in effect, provide a revenue stream to maintain rates at a level of which is appropriate for that community. It’s a really good example of local communities taking responsibility for local issues, and that is a principle that on this side of the House we very much support, and hence why we are supporting this bill.

What has been done here by New Plymouth District Council in the past was to create this fund and there were, as the member articulated, some challenges and issues, post the 2008 global financial crisis, in which the way in which the fund was managed would lead to the fact that the capital amount did drop to levels that were deemed unsustainable. As a result of changes within that council, that amount of investment fund has now been rebuilt and built back up to the amount that it is today. I think no one can underestimate the scale of that investment fund and the benefits that are at play. It’s also good to see that this Government are supporting asset recycling and the concept of recycling of assets and using that capital investment in order to benefit local communities. Because, in effect, this is what this investment fund does. The provisions around the changes in this bill, ring-fencing it to ensure that it stays very much in the bounds of the boundary of the New Plymouth community, is one that is sensible—it is their asset and that asset should remain in community control.

The other changes that have been outlined in the bill, I think, in particular, are reasonably administrative. But in terms of the concept, in terms of supporting that capital for the New Plymouth community into the future, it is something that we very much support and we look forward to this going through the select committee process. I commend this bill to the House.

It is a pleasure to rise to take a call on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill. Can I begin by just commending my colleague Glen Bennett. We often have a little bit of healthy competition between ourselves around sunshine—it looks like Marlborough, close to Nelson, is doing quite well this year, so I might claim that. But, look, I just want to congratulate the member because it’s been a useful day today; we’ve got three private and local bills coming before the House which is very unusual on a members’ day. I do want to acknowledge that for the three of us who have had bills today, it means that members’ bills that would otherwise have been towards the top of the Order Paper do get bumped down a little. I do want to acknowledge that for those members, it must be somewhat frustrating. But there is an important process in these bills—for local bills, it’s very important that councils are able to come to the Parliament and have legislation put through that is going to improve their communities in a way that they may not be able to do through their own policies.

So I thank the member Glen Bennett for the explanation of what has come about, what has led to this bill, and also the PIF fund—the Perpetual Investment Fund—as he called it. It’s always good to have a good acronym for a financial mechanism; one of my favourite things is to have a good acronym.

So Mr Bennett has explained that, a while ago, the council chose to sell its shareholdings in Powerco and that the intention of doing that was to be able to bring down the rates that people in New Plymouth pay to the council, and that the fund was supposed to be sustainable and be able to last in perpetuity so that it wouldn’t run down. And we can see that that is not what occurred and that there was a time when the fund dropped down to quite seriously low levels and the council has had to do a very good rescue job, I must say, of getting that back up to the levels that it is today—but still lower than where it would be if it had been inflation adjusted.

So what I think is good about this bill, and where I do commend the council, is putting in place a process to come to Parliament so that that fund can be treated in a sustainable way. It’s important that, with governance, part of good governance is ensuring that when people change roles—when you have people elected into new roles—that you don’t necessarily lose the important principles that you’ve placed around a fund such as this. And I think what is very, very sensible is to ensure that, through this bill, the council will be able to satisfy the need for this fund to be used in a sustainable way. I note that, in the past, it’s been used for a couple of particular purposes. One is, as I mentioned, to reduce rates for ratepayers, but, also, the potential to invest in community assets and funding for the development of things like walkways, things that are going to benefit the New Plymouth community.

As the previous speaker, Mr Watts, noted, the bill also does another very good thing, which is to ring-fence this for the local community should there be an amalgamation at some point in the future. I’m not aware of what the discussions are in the area about potential amalgamations—I know in my area we sometimes have those conversations—but it is important that an asset that has been built up by those people will be able to be ring-fenced for that purpose, and so I can see that being a very good part of the bill.

I do note that the council has also gone through the process of considering some other options, and I think that’s wise before bringing something to the Parliament to see whether there is something else that can be done. So one of the things was to do nothing and retain the status quo or an enhanced version, by taking measures such as listing the PIF as a strategic asset, or to establish an entire new trust. Having said that, the council determined that they would proceed with a bill before Parliament. I think this is a good local bill that will go before the scrutiny of a select committee, which is where it will get further consideration, and I commend it to the House.

Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. Thank you. The Green Party is pleased to support the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill, and congratulates Glen Bennett for his work with the council and others on bringing it to the House. As others have said—and I won’t take a long call—this bill is because of the issues during the global financial crisis, when the money that the fund paid to the council to offset against rates and reduce the rates cost was too much, given the returns that the fund was making, and so it didn’t continue to grow the capital of the fund. So the bill seeks to redress that, and it is certainly also ensuring that any of the benefits of the spending of the money is ring-fenced.

I notice that the council did do community consultation and has invited people to have their say on what was being planned, and there has been some debate locally, because at the moment the fund does help the council reduce its rates, but it does mean that renters and others potentially don’t get benefits from the fund revenue and the way that it is invested. So there was a strong call for things like social housing to be invested in by the council to ensure that the wider community benefits. The bill is good because in terms of the purposes for which the funds can be applied for, it does provide for “the social, economic, environmental, and cultural well-being of current and future communities of the New Plymouth District.”

I think there will also be a debate, potentially, in submissions about some wanting any depletion of the fund below what is provided in investment revenue to only be in emergencies. The bill provides a more generous ground where the council “considers, on reasonable grounds,” that it will benefit the wellbeing of current and future communities more than “maintaining the real value of the capital”.

So, obviously, submissions on that may improve the bill, but it does seem to have been through quite a thorough process by the New Plymouth District Council in looking out for the welfare of its current and future communities in how these funds, which resulted from the sale of its shareholding in Powerco back in 2004, are best invested. The Greens are pleased to support it.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It is a great pleasure to rise and take a call on this wonderful bill shepherded to this House by a wonderful MP for New Plymouth, my good colleague Glen Bennett. It’s great to have an equally good select committee—the Governance and Administration Committee—to have this bill come through our select committee as well.

When I first started reading the background notes to the Perpetual Investment Fund (PIF) for the New Plymouth District Council, I was brought back to my days when I sat on the board of Foundation North. Of course, spot the similarities, I guess, as both of these organisations administer what we call a perpetual investment fund. So in terms of perpetuality when we talk about investment funds, it’s making sure that the earnings that we get, we don’t just spend it, we don’t spend the base money, but we also invest it back into the fund so that that money can be reinvested. We used to use financial instruments like the stock exchange, we used to go on to Wall Street and buy all the shares, and any sort of way that we can get profit from, we get it back into the actual starting pot of the money so that there is actually money for the future. And that’s actually geared for inflation as well so that inflation doesn’t rot into the actual value of the starting-out fund.

So being able to responsibly look after the money that is on behalf of the benefactors—in this case, it’s the people in the New Plymouth district, and so it’s really important. I’m really pleased that this bill actually safeguards a lot of the perimeters that we have in that respect in just making sure that all the fund that is gained from PIF is actually used for current and future communities of New Plymouth as defined by the actual physical boundaries, but also making sure that the financial managers, which they can, from time to time or continuously, engage with, actually have best-practice investment decisions. So making sure that there is due diligence being done on those who actually manage the fund, those who do the investment, and the way that they actually look after the money is all in the best interests of the people of New Plymouth.

It’s really great to also see just once again that good governance theme come through this afternoon in making sure not only is the money there, and it was through the sale of Powerco, but also making sure that those who look after it go through the right steps. So we’ve strengthened it through this bill, but also making sure that in the future, as people come in as guardianship of this pūtea, that they will continue to enable this pūtea to do good things for their communities and for the purpose in which this fund was set up.

I was also just reading a little bit more into the organisation and I guess you could say the ambition that the New Plymouth District Council had for this fund. Not only can we see that it’s already benefited the taxpayers by forking up a percentage of their taxpayers’ bill, but also making sure that if in the future they want to look at other different projects, to invest in the community, to make sure that it truly delivers for the region around New Plymouth and making sure that there are actually benefits, tangible benefits, that this fund will bring. In order for the people of New Plymouth to actually enjoy these tangible benefits, we have to make sure it’s a long-term focus—that it’s a future-looking fund as well.

So today, here in this House, we set strengthened the perimeters of those rules in making sure that we prevent from things like the global financial crisis (GFC)—and reading back into the history of this fund, we know that there were a couple of tricky years in the GFC where investments were being sold off and the actual the pot of money was being slowly eroded away. I think back once again to my days on the Foundation North board as well, where we were told to sit tight. So good financial advisers will give you great strategy to weather those storms in the financial market. And so by having the strength that we have right now in this bill—that will no doubt come into force, because I think we’ve got the support of both sides of the House—we’ll be able to ride those storms and we’ll be able to see that future generations all benefit from this pūtea.

So, once again, congratulations to my colleague Glen Bennett for bringing this bill to the House, and I commend this bill to the House.

Look, it gives me great pleasure to let the House know, to let the people of New Plymouth know, and the New Plymouth District Council know, that the ACT Party will support this bill, because the ACT Party believes that local government, councils like the New Plymouth District Council, should be able to say what happens to their assets, they should be able to control them, they should be able to decide whether they sell them, how they use them, what dividends they seek to recover, and so on. Imagine that: local government gets to decide whether they sell their assets and put the money into an investment fund—that’s what New Plymouth District Council did with Powerco all those years ago. They sold their electricity infrastructure assets—the local lines company—because they thought they’d be able to do something better with the money. And what they did was they invested in this capitalist concept called equities and stocks, which the fund trades on stock markets, long-term institutional investments. That’s a concept which might be alien to our comrades in the Labour Party, that if you invest money wisely in things that produce a profit, then that profit can be used to do other things with—that’s right.

So the ACT Party supports the concept behind this bill that councils should be able to use their assets or dispose of them as long as they have a democratic mandate to do so—that’s right. They don’t want their assets flogged by central government like the three waters assets will be flogged—those billions and billions of dollars’ worth of assets that we’ve heard that Minister Nanaia Mahuta believes should actually sit with a State corporation rather than local government. They don’t want Governments to tell them what they should and shouldn’t be allowed to sell.

So the ACT Party will support this bill. We think that the New Plymouth District Council, through its proposed amendment to the deed, to the guardianship of these assets in the fund, actually, is setting itself up for a successful future, because there was a problem when successive councils decided to draw down heavily on the fund’s capital, rather than rely solely on the profits of the fund to fund the things that council wanted to do. And that shows you, actually, some of the problems that Governments that spend beyond their means can get into, like this current lot—this current Labour Government: spending, spending, spending beyond their means; borrowing, borrowing, borrowing to hand out cash like a drunken—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): Order! Order! The member will come back to this bill.

SIMON COURT: Thank you, Madam Speaker, for your direction. So it shows you that if you spend unwisely, if you draw down the capital of your fund faster than it can be replenished, then in the end you’ll have less money at the end to make a profit from. So what New Plymouth District Council have worked out is that if they maintain the fund, if they keep money in it, it keeps generating profits; if they keep investing in things that make a profit, then they will have more money to allocate back to the people of New Plymouth. So the ACT Party thinks that’s a great idea, but there are certainly lessons to be learnt. I hope that the member sponsoring this bill, Glen Bennett from New Plymouth, advocates strongly for the position that the New Plymouth District Council has taken with respect to their assets—capitalism, investing in things that make a profit—with his caucus and with the Ministers who are responsible: say, the Minister of Finance, who’s responsible for working out how much Government should spend; or the Minister of Revenue, David Parker, how much the Government needs to take in tax—I’ll say the Minister of Transport, Michael Wood, who’s responsible for working out how much needs to be spent on the roads in New Zealand, including in New Plymouth and Taranaki, which are full of potholes, versus how much revenue is collected from different revenue streams like fuel excise duty and road-user charges.

So lots of valuable lessons in this bill for this Labour Government, and particularly for the Labour caucus when they go back into caucus to work out how they’re going to come up with the money for all of next year’s election promises. The New Plymouth District Council doesn’t have that problem because they’re taking a responsible attitude to managing their assets for the greater good of their people. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It is my pleasure to take a call on this bill. I’m really pleased that I’m able to make a contribution, and I want to acknowledge my colleague—member Glen Bennett—for bringing this private bill to the House and specifically to highlight the importance of this bill for the residents, current and future, living in the New Plymouth district, and the Perpetual Investment Fund, and why it is important that there is protection and preservation of this Perpetual Investment Fund. So I’ll just call it PIF, because it’s a little bit of a long term.

I’m really pleased that across the House other representatives can see the benefit of the PIF for the community that it has been derived from. We know that as a result of investment decisions back in the 1980s and the closing of the Powerco company, there was the enablement and the commencement of the New Plymouth PIF Guardians, in terms of securing in the continuity of the benefit in the New Plymouth District Council.

I just want to quickly highlight in my contribution that the principles for this fund are really important: that the community have got the supports, because these funds are for local ratepayers and local purpose of community activities. You could somewhat call it a nest egg, in that the current residents in the New Plymouth district know that the guardians that are appointed to the governance of the group know the local residents understand the local community and can also weigh up in their governance decisions why this fund is protected and preserved for that.

So just as I wrap up: it provides the sustainable future, good principles on collaboration, the understanding of the council to the local New Plymouth PIF Guardians who will make good decisions. It is important that when you do have a governance group who very quickly do understand local activity and local communities, that they see the benefit for future populations. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to take a brief call on the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill. I have sat through the debate. I want to also congratulate my colleague Glen Bennett who has introduced this bill—is sponsoring this local bill—and for him giving some background to why we have this here today. As somebody who doesn’t come from that area, it was really helpful for me to know, and I was actually thinking about how, unfortunately, I think, in my area we don’t have something like this. So how fortunate the residents and ratepayers of New Plymouth are to have this fund. You can see why it is that they have brought the bill here, the remedy that they are seeking, and this being the avenue to be able to provide them with the ability to do the things that it is that they want to do.

What I wanted to particularly highlight this afternoon was that the council considered a number of options, but the points that I wanted to raise were really about having considered all of its options, including its experience with the New Plymouth District Council (Waitara Lands) Act 2018. The council resolved on 8 March to develop this draft and draft this local bill and use the special consultative procedure under the Local Government Act to engage with its communities on the draft local bill. So they’ve already done some consultation around this. It is being referred to a select committee to hear further submissions and do further work on it. But through that process, through the community consultation, which opened on 13 May and closed on 17 June, 52 submissions were received. Following consideration of the written submissions, the council determined on 26 July 2022 to proceed with a local bill to regulate the Perpetual Investment Fund (PIF). When I was listening to “PIF” I was thinking of “TIF” which is another fund which we do benefit from up north, that is the Tourism Infrastructure Fund, but that is not what this is; this is the PIF and it is specifically for New Plymouth.

And so the council considered that the draft bill should require the council to consider the following principles when dealing with the PIF: that it should be used in a perpetual manner; that the capital base may be used if circumstances arise warranting it; and that investments should be independently managed, on a prudent commercial basis, and to avoid prejudicing the council’s reputation.

So I want to commend the council for going through that process and then bringing it here, also to the member Glen Bennett who has brought it here this afternoon, and I wish the select committee well in working through their submission process and coming back with the legislation in the best form that it can be. And with that, I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. The National Party is supporting this bill, the New Plymouth District Council (Perpetual Investment Fund) Bill, in its first reading today. The National Party recognises that the shares that were sold that have built up this fund are tagged for the benefit of the New Plymouth ratepayers and the New Plymouth District Council boundaries, and understands the need to ring-fence that and futureproof it in case of any further or future amalgamations.

The National Party is very keen to see the assets that belong to ratepayers secured for those ratepayers if it is a perpetual fund like this or their water assets. The National Party believes they should stay in ratepayer control and ownership and so the benefit of that fund is also, by the virtue of this bill, secured for the people of New Plymouth. So we support the bill. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to speak in support of this bill, and I again congratulate my friend and colleague Glen Bennett for bringing the bill.

I just wanted to comment briefly on the comments made by my friend in ACT Simon Court because from that recount, one listening at home would think that this was an enormous success. Powerco was one of the groups that bought up a whole lot of council assets when they were sold, and, as a consequence the Queensland Government, now own Powerco; alongside AMP Limited. So the Australians now own our major asset, in that way—and that’s a really sad thing from my point of view. Nevertheless, we are here to make things as right as we can, and this bill seems to be doing exactly that. This bill will actually support the investment, in this community, of the money that came out of that; after what sounds like a very rocky time with that money. So it’s a way of securing it for that community. And thus, I am commending this bill to the House.

Kia ora, Madam Speaker. Thank you very much to all members and parties that have contributed this afternoon to this debate. I’m glad—well, hopeful. Promises have been made that everybody supports it. I look forward to the vote and it making it to select committee.

Well, I actually want to follow on from what my colleague Helen White said around the fund, because if we look back even before Powerco, it was the energy reforms of the 1990s that basically started the chain reaction to Powerco being sold off to an Australian company. It was the Taranaki Electric Power Board, which was owned, obviously, by the council. Then, obviously reform happened and the assets were sold off, but, that’s right, let’s not talk about protecting the assets, because that’s a whole ‘nother kettle of fish.

I just want to say thank you to everyone this afternoon for your contribution and also for the fact that I don’t know how many times I’ve heard PIF said in this House before, but it was a lot. I also want to say that for some of you who were far more elegant than me, my PIFs were sort of pff whereas, actually, Lemauga Lydia Sosene, I think, had the most elegant and articulate PIF, which I won’t even be able to articulate as she did. But obviously it is the Perpetual Investment Fund, and I’m grateful that we will be supporting it this afternoon. I want to acknowledge my Green Party colleague the Hon Eugenie Sage, who talks about the New Plymouth District Council and their due diligence and also the concerns, because there are some concerns that were raised in that process in the due jiligence—do jili—do—

Hon Members: Due diligence.

GLEN BENNETT: Due diligence. It’s all the Ps and the Ds.

I hear that and have had conversations back in the electorate of New Plymouth about that. So that’s why going to select committee and having those conversations and having more submissions made on this will be helpful.

I also would like to acknowledge Simon Watts in terms of him talking about the additional protections, which is why we’re here today, because the council is asking for those additional protections around this piece of legislation. I am grateful that people are supporting this. This bill is about paying it forward. This bill is around legacy work in terms of looking to the future. It’s around making sure that the benefits received today from our history are passed on to our future. It’s providing an intergenerational equity, ensuring that future generations do not lose out on the benefits due to short-term thinking.

So this piece of legislation is important, and I know that the New Plymouth District Council is looking forward to it’s going through all stages in this House and to help the council to be able to continue to run services. You know, we mentioned earlier, my colleague Rachel Boyack, around things like the Festival of Lights and investing in new services, such as the extension of our coastal walkway all the way to Waitara, but ensuring that investment into our rates to ensure that people can live, yes, in the sunniest city in New Zealand—it’s a true story; three years in a row, I believe. I’m sorry, Rachel Boyack, it’s not Nelson. I am grateful that we are here about to vote, and I commend this bill to the House.

Bill read a first time.

Bill referred to the Governance and Administration Committee.