Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill

I move, That the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

As a sponsor of the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill, it’s my pleasure to take this call to highly commend this bill to the House. This bill was introduced on 12 September 2019, and it’s great to see that this bill has come up for its final—that is, the third—reading today, despite us missing so many members’ days due to COVID-19.

At the time when I had a discussion with the chair of the Auckland Regional Amenities Board, I did say to him that we will do our best to see that this bill goes through the parliamentary process as soon as possible. So I’m sure all nine amenities that are specified in the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act 2008 and the Auckland Regional Amenities Board will be quite pleased to see that this bill has come up for its third reading. The Auckland Regional Amenities Board did a great job of lobbying for this bill and it is a great privilege to be the sponsor of this legislation.

They wrote to all Auckland-based members of Parliament, because I believe members of Parliament from all sides would have something to do with these Auckland regional amenities at some point because they do some really important work in the community. That’s how I got in touch with the Stardome Observatory, which was part of Mt Roskill but because of recent boundary changes, now it’s in another electorate, a neighbouring electorate.

So other than the Stardome Observatory, the other Auckland regional amenities are Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, which is situated on Queen Street in Auckland; Auckland Rescue Helicopter Trust, in Mechanics Bay; Auckland Theatre Company, in Mount Eden; Coastguard Northern Region, in Mechanics Bay; New Zealand Opera, in Parnell; Surf Lifesaving Northern Region, in Mechanics Bay; Auckland Arts Festival, in Auckland Central; and WaterSafe Auckland, also known as Drowning Prevention Auckland, in St Marys Bay. So I said that I had this great opportunity to be the sponsor of this legislation because of my relationship with the Stardome Observatory, which is one of the amenities that is based in Royal Oak, which was part of Mount Roskill, where I’m based as a National list member of Parliament.

After the first reading of this bill, this bill was referred to the Governance and Administration Committee on 25 September 2019, and I had the opportunity to sub on that select committee as I’m not a regular member of that select committee. And I want to thank the chair, Dr Jian Yang, and deputy chair, Ginny Andersen, for their contributions in the select committee process. I also want to thank Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment officials, Parliamentary Counsel Office, and committee clerks for their help during the discussions on this bill in the select committee.

The nine amenities that are specified in the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act 2008 and the Auckland Regional Amenities Board are fully supportive of this legislation going through. Currently, these amenities are technically in breach of the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act 2008, because since the change that was made to the Charities Act 2005, these amenities have been preparing their financial statements according to the standard that is required as per the Charities Act 2005, but Audit New Zealand, which audits these amenities for their compliance with the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act, has given a waiver on the understanding that this bill will pass.

In very simple terms, what this bill does is it takes away the requirement of preparing financial statements as per the New Zealand International Financial Reporting Standards, which is required under the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act, and it replaces them with the standard which is the Public Benefit Entity Financial Reporting Standard in the Charities Act 2005. So it’s a very simple change. It is a technical error this bill is going to fix.

Now, what is important to note is that these two standards are different in the sense—they’re not too different, but they are different—that it requires these amenities to support these two pieces of legislation, to prepare two sets of financial statements, which is just unnecessarily adding another layer of work for these amenities.

So because these amenities are charities, they are registered as charitable organisations; that is, not for profit. And the standard, which is in the Charities Act 2005, is the one that is more suitable, the one which is more fit for purpose. [Interruption] I know that some members are getting really agitated because they didn’t have the opportunity to work with this amenity that is based in Mount Roskill, Mr Speaker—Madam Speaker. Sorry, I see the change. But that just reflects on that relationship and the working ethics that you have in the electorate where you’re based. And yes, I had the opportunity to work with them and I’m the sponsor of this legislation.

Coming back to the bill, this legislation is to fix the error that has been there since 2015, because these entities are public charitable entities and the standard that is required under the Charities Act 2005 is more suitable for these entities. Why should we add another layer of work for these entities? So this legislation, by fixing this technical error, will actually remove that extra layer of work that is required of these nine amenities that are specified in the Auckland Regional Amenities Act.

The changes that this bill intends to make would start applying from financial years that are in progress on the date of the Royal assent or the most recently completed financial year, but only if the Royal assent was given before the statutory deadline for entities to lodge their annual report. These deadlines are three months after balance date for the nine specified amenities; five months after balance date for the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Board. This is really good because it gives absolute clarity to all entities that are involved.

On top of these changes, it’s important that I mention that there is a retrospective validation in this legislation, but it’s important to note that the retrospective validation is not a blanket validation for non-compliance. It’s only for entities that have been complying with the Charities Act 2005. They will be getting this retrospective validation. So, yes, the bill is intended to validate matters generally understood to be lawful, but are in fact unlawful, but they are unlawful as a result of a technical error. So it’s a bill that fixes this technical error in the principal Act; that is, the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act 2008, by changing the standard that is in the Charities Act 2005 for financial reporting for these amenities. All these nine amenities are really looking forward to seeing this bill passed, because they are sitting with this burden of non-compliance at the moment. This legislation was absolutely needed to fix this technical error. Without this legislation, we could not fix this error.

It is a great pleasure to be the sponsor of this legislation. I had support for this bill from all parties and that’s why it has come to this stage, and I am looking forward to that support continuing in this reading as well, to support all nine amenities that are specified in the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act 2008. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Look, this has been a real crackerjack debate as this piece of legislation, the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill, has wound its way through the House, from its first reading some time ago to its—well, I hope to be—conclusion today. As the local member elected in Mt Roskill and as a member who lives in that electorate as well, it’s my real pleasure to see this legislation progressing because it does affect one of the amenities which is situated in my electorate. That’s the Stardome. I know it’s a long drive over from Bucklands Beach for the sponsoring member, Dr Parmjeet Parmar, but I’d encourage her to visit from time to time. It’s a good place to go.

In my second reading speech, I reflected a little bit on the value of that institution to our community. Not only is it an important educational institution which opens the eyes and the minds of our children in an important, educational way but it’s an important facility for the community more generally. I don’t think I’ve ever actually had more feedback on a parliamentary speech, which maybe says something about my parliamentary speeches, rather than my recollection of one evening there after a couple of nice glasses of wine, of watching the slightly psychedelic Pink Floyd show that’s put on at the Stardome Observatory, where you sort of sit back and as well as listening to the outstandingly good albums of Pink Floyd in the late 1970s and early 1980s, there’s a wonderful light show which is projected on to the star dome above you. So I can affirm to the House that this is an amenity that we do wish to see well supported.

But beyond that, there are eight other amenities, nine amenities in total, which are covered by this bill: Stardome, Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, Auckland Rescue Helicopter, Auckland Theatre Company, New Zealand Opera, Surf Life Saving, and the Auckland Arts Festival; two other really important ones are both WaterSafe and Coastguard Northern. Some good news for both of those institutions because, of course, in the Budget last month, there was a really good funding boost for both of those two important institutions, who’ve often really had to shake the tin around, and the Government is showing its support for them.

I think it’s important for the House to have a little bit of historical perspective on these pieces of legislation when they come forward and to understand why it is that we’re doing what we’re doing through this process. To do that, you have to go back to 2005 and the Charities Act at that stage. But around the same time as well, the fifth Labour Government under the Hon Judith Tizard—and this is in 2008—established the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act. This was actually a really important piece of legislation for Auckland. This was in the pre super-city days, when we had seven different territorial local authorities (TLAs). We had these amenities around the region, but actually mainly focused in the central part of Auckland, mainly in the Auckland City part of the region. But they were amenities that were enjoyed by all Aucklanders across those seven territorial local authorities. So, effectively, there was an equity question, because the funding for these entities came from one territorial local authority, Auckland City, but the benefits were enjoyed by many.

So how did you deal with that? The way that that Government dealt with it was through the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act, which, effectively, set up a levy system across those seven TLAs so that ratepayers from across the whole region who benefited from them put some money into the kitty to ensure that there was a sustainable funding base. So that was one of the key bits of legislation that gets us to this point.

The second key bit of legislation was the Charities Act 2005. The key issue that we are reconciling between those two pieces of legislation is that the 2008 Act requires that financial statements are drawn up by the international financial reporting standards, whereas the Charities Act requires them to be drawn up under the generally accepted accounting practice. So that’s a significant problem for these entities, that they’ve got two pieces of legislation which require different accounting standards in the drawing up of their financial statements, something of an oversight.

The real challenge that that’s resulted in is that these entities, to some degree, have possibly not been compliant with at least one of the laws or they’ve had to draw up two different sets of financial statements and reports in accordance with two different standards, which obviously is a significant amount of additional work for no real benefit. So that’s the problem that, fundamentally, this bill seeks to resolve. I’m pleased that it does, and it seems to get us to that point, and I’m pleased that the bill has support from all of the nine amenities, who obviously want a simpler process to go through here.

The bill did have a little bit of a working over at the Governance and Administration Committee. All of the submissions were in support of the bill, but there were some awkward little issues to work through. We had a great committee stage debate on this bill. It was enjoyed by everyone that was in the Chamber. It went on for over two hours, in fact, but some important issues were traversed, including the fact that there is quite an interesting aspect of this legislation, which is that it does actually have a retrospective component, where it actually goes back in time and, effectively, validates the financial reporting of these amenities, from memory—and I stand to be corrected by any member of the House—I think back to about 2013.

So it was important that the House did satisfy itself that that was appropriate, but I think the judgment of most members was that it was. There is no suggestion that any of these entities have been doing anything that is inappropriate. We are very clear that all of the entities have been doing their best to comply with the law, but they have simply been caught in the middle of two pieces of legislation which pull in two slightly different directions. So I’m really pleased that we’ve managed to bridge that.

The key thing with this piece of legislation is that it gives a sustainable path forward for these entities. I think we’re all aware that in the current period that we’re in, the funding base for many important public amenities is a little bit uncertain. I think those of us who are based in Auckland have been watching the severe challenges that the Auckland Council is facing at the moment, in terms of how it continues to financially support important programmes, important infrastructure, and important amenities. So the last thing that we want in what will be a challenging period is for any of these important amenities to have any uncertainty in terms of whether they are meeting their requirements and in terms of, therefore, how comfortable Auckland ratepayers feel about continuing to fund them. So I think this is a useful bill, both in reconciling a legislative inconsistency but also setting up these entities to have a stable path forward into the future.

It is just worth clarifying, within this bill, that what we are dealing with here are the financial statements that the entities have to provide, but they are overseen by a board, the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Board, which is set up to oversee them, to oversee the distribution, effectively, of the levy which is put on Auckland ratepayers and is then passed through the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Board to the entities. So I think that is one point that it was just worth clarifying in this debate—that we’re dealing with a board which oversees the nine entities, but then the financial statements of the entities themselves are the ones with which we are concerned.

The one other thing I want to raise in this contribution is, I guess, going back to the core issue, which is we’re dealing with some quite important entities in our largest city, who have had to deal with a question of legislative inconsistency, which has created some problems and which has now had to take a reasonable amount of the House’s time to try and rectify. I think it’s worth all members of the House just reflecting on how that came to be and all of us reflecting on how we can ensure that we have processes in the House to ensure that in the future we don’t end up in a situation like this again.

💬 Dr Parmjeet Parmar: Prisoners voting bill—talk about that.

Not about that—well, on this side of the House, Ms Parmar, we are relentlessly focused on the future and on how we improve things in New Zealand. So I would find it extraordinary if in a bill in which we are trying to rectify an issue where something hasn’t quite worked out, we don’t actually apply our collective minds to thinking about how we can do things better for New Zealand in the future. I kind of feel that perhaps that signifies a little bit about the difference between the two sides of the House at the moment, where one side of the House, which is completely negative, as we just heard from that interjection, is always looking back and one side of the House actually wants to say how do we do things better and make progress for New Zealand. That’s the Government that Jacinda Ardern’s led. That’s what we believe on this side of the House.

So in a very modest way, I was simply suggesting that given that this bill deals with a legislative inconsistency, as we form legislation for the people of New Zealand into the future, let’s make sure that as parliamentarians and as a parliamentary institution, we have good processes and checks and balances to ensure that that doesn’t happen in the future. I don’t think that’s a particularly unreasonable thing to put to the House, but it’s causing my colleague from Bucklands Beach a little bit of concern over there. But, look, all I would say is that, yeah, she’s had a moment in the sun with this bill. It’s possibly been the peak of her career as a legislator to have passed this bill through the House. So I would just encourage her to enjoy the moment and the fact that we’re all paying so much attention to this piece of legislation and the fact that it’s going to pass the House, I think, quite happily this afternoon. Well done to her. Well done to everyone. And I commend the bill to the House.

I rise to speak briefly on this Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill. I want to thank my good friend and colleague, hard-working MP Dr Parmjeet Parmar, who sponsors this particular bill. Now, she’s based in Mt Roskill. She’s very close to her constituents, and that is why this bill is under her name. She is the sponsor, and we should recognise the hard work and also her contribution to the Governance and Administration Committee, because the committee did consider this bill very thoroughly, and Dr Parmjeet Parmar always came to the committee and listened to submitters and made all sorts of recommendations and decisions—so, good work. I’m very pleased that, finally, we now come to the third reading of this particular bill.

This is a very good bill. It is not a major bill, yet it is very, very important to Aucklanders because it involves some specified amenities which are important to Aucklanders—right? The bill itself helps some specified amenities by allowing them to do financial reporting, or statements, under one particular single set of requirements, and that is, of course, the generally accepted accounting practice (GAAP). At the moment, of course, legally, they have to do both this one, that we call GAAP, and also the other one, that is NZ IFRS—that is, New Zealand International Financial Reporting Standards. So, basically, there’s a duplication. This is due to a particular error in legislation. That is why this bill, although not a particularly major bill, is very important, because these amenities are so important to Aucklanders.

Now, many of these amenities, of course, the previous two speakers have mentioned. I can still go through some of them. There are nine amenities who are receiving funding from this particular Act—that is, from the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act, this particular Act. Now, when you look at the Auckland Arts Festival—I actually had a look at their website just before I came to the House. They have had many events, largely based on, of course, arts—that’s painting, music—and very innovative arts. Also, they do education, so many children could learn from these particular activities organised by this Auckland Arts Festival. Also, the Auckland Arts Festival has a specific focus on ethnic communities, so we could see arts from the Asian community, Pasifika, and Māori communities. So it’s very important for these communities.

And, also, look at what we call the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra. Of course, we all understand people listen to music, and every year over 250,000 Aucklanders would go to the concerts. So that’s a large number. Also, they have an education programme. Kids, children, would come to these concerts, and they have their own outreach activities to all different schools, just like Stardome Observatory. So they’re similar. Similarly, they have these education programmes. Actually, at the moment they are more actively engaging schools. Their staff would go to schools to give them knowledge about the universe and space. So all these amenities, they are not huge amenities yet are very important to Aucklanders. This bill itself will, then, make it easier for these amenities to do the financial reporting.

At the committee stage, of course, we made some changes, including the commencement date. Basically, we could include the financial years when this legislation commenced. Also, we have another amendment, and that is retrospective validation, because they have been doing this financial reporting since the 2014-2015 financial year, and then now, basically, we will say, in past years, it’s still fine for them to have one single set of financial reporting. They do not need to go back and do the second one. So this will make the job easier.

So the bill itself—as I said, it’s a very good bill and very helpful. I thank Dr Parmjeet Parmar for her work. I thank all the submitters, particularly the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Board, for their contribution and various other contributions. I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker, for the opportunity to take a brief call on the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill. I just want to acknowledge the member in charge of this bill, my good friend, Dr Parmjeet Parmar, who has shepherded this bill all the way through from first reading to now. An important piece of legislation, very much a piece of legislation which the National Party would support fully because it’s about cutting red tape. The ironic thing about the legislation is that these very important Auckland regional amenities are required to essentially do two sets of financial accounts according to two different financial standards. One, the New Zealand International Financial Reporting Standards and the second being the generally accepted accounting practice standard. The issue here is that, essentially, the bill provides for them only having to do one set of accounts, according to the GAAP, which is the generally accepted accounting practice, according to the Charities Act.

This is a very sensible change, a very sensible amendment, because it cuts the amount of red tape and it means there’ll be less money spent on accountants and more money being spent on the very important regional amenities that Aucklanders, like myself, have come to know and love. And that’s always a good idea. It’s always a good idea when more money is being spent on the actual activity and the things we’re trying to fund, the things we’re trying to deliver, rather than bureaucrats and accountants. And accountants do a very important job, and there’s some very good accountants in this House. But if we can try and cut some of the cost and the red tape and the bureaucracy, we’ll be able to have more music from the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, more opera from the New Zealand Opera, we’ll have more theatre from the Auckland Theatre Company, more arts from the Auckland Arts Festival, the Stardome in Dr Parmjeet Parmar’s area where she represents as a list MP—

💬 Michael Wood: No, no, she’s in the member’s area. The member is her member.

—will be able to do the great work that they do. And I really don’t like how the member for Mt Roskill is so critical of Bucklands Beach. It’s a beautiful part of Auckland, and I’m very proud to represent it. He knows that area very well, and I understand he was a candidate for that seat and lost a couple of times and I just want to remind him of that. So Bucklands Beach is a beautiful part, but I do remind the member it rejected him twice. I’m very proud to represent that part of Auckland.

💬 Hon Louise Upston: It’s got good taste now.

It’s got good taste. That’s right, Louise Upston, very good taste, the people of Bucklands Beach. They are good people who live in Bucklands Beach. I’m very proud to represent them and the beautiful beaches and the Coastguard Northern Region which operate from Howick. I mean, they do an amazing job helping save lives out through the Hauraki and particularly all the people in my electorate who love going out on the water and so many other great causes. I will finish there. But thank you, Parmjeet Parmar, for bringing this bill. Thank you to the Auckland regional amenities board for what they do. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Thank you for this opportunity to offer some thoughts on this particular member’s bill. First, though, I’d like to address the member Simeon Brown’s pathway to Parliament. He mentioned our colleague on this side of the House, and I’m curious if that member would like to explain to the House at some point in time his pathway to find himself in here. If I recall correctly, in my first stand, the member was all of a sudden a South Aucklander, now the member is now an east Aucklander, and I’m a little bit confused about the member’s pathway. But the beauty about that member’s ability to span across Auckland—and I take his point that this particular bill is good for Auckland—I think if that member can offer a perspective from South Auckland and east Auckland, good on him.

As the member for Tāmaki Makaurau, of course, my electorate spans both south up to the bridge, out to the west in Pīhā, and over to the east—quite a large area of Auckland. This particular bill is one of those bills that—I know it sounds Auckland-centric, and there are a number of members in the House that aren’t from Auckland, but if we can toot our own horn and say that the Blues are the best rugby team in the country, and, secondly, that this particular bill will make sure that the amenities in some of those seats—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): I think you should be very careful in case the Speaker closes down this speech for comments like that.

We’ll see when the Blues play the Crusaders coming up.

But look, you know, the bill talks about, in particular, the Auckland Regional Rescue Helicopter Trust and the Surf Life Saving Northern Region. As a former Minister of the voluntary sector and the charity sector, I’ve met with these particular organisations on a number of occasions in the past, and there’ve been a couple of things that they’ve raised with us. One of them is the lack of funding and security for those particular organisations. And first, I’d like to point out that this Government in the last Budget made a significant announcement to make sure that we are able to support surf lifesaving in Aotearoa New Zealand, which is a great announcement. Now, this particular bill actually brings in line an anomaly that is clearly defined in the preamble of the bill, which is really important because I recall my discussions with them, and they talked about the opportunity to just tidy up some of the aspects in what are, seemingly across Aotearoa, a number of anomalies within the surf lifesaving area and the water health safety area, more broadly speaking. This particular bill serves to do that.

One of the other aspects—as the member for Tāmaki Makaurau, I’m really proud because quite a large number of Māori kaupapa are covered by this particular bill: things that will allow the flourishing of Māori Te Reo and arts kaupapa across Tāmaki Makaurau, for different organisations to serve a population which is really keen on those types of events. It is where we can get along and support, namely, over the next couple of weeks, the Matariki festival, which will see a huge number of charitable organisations, Māori and Pacific in particular, across big parts of my electorate, where organisations will be at this very minute practising and getting prepared to make sure that they are able to present themselves, and now they can do that with this anomaly fixed up. It just brings into line a few tricky parts of accounting that will allow those particular organisations to now focus on their performance for Matariki instead of their bookkeeping.

It was always one of those issues that many of our charities and our organisations in our communities have always asked for—and that’s simplifying bureaucracy or stripping it away—and this particular bill we’re happy to support and we want to commend the member Parmjeet Parmar, as well as the Government and Administration Committee, for what I hear was a robust debate through this particular bill. But also as I watched it throughout the House, there has been quite a bit of to and fro from all sides of the House with regard to this bill. However, collectively, we can all agree that this particular bill will be a good piece of legislation for the community of Tāmaki Makaurau. So, look, without going on too much further, this is a good bill. There are a number of things that I think, once this bill has passed, where we as a collective, in particular those from Auckland, can sit down and have a look at some of the other pieces of legislation that I think could be amended to make our beautiful city of Tāmaki Makaurau even better and even more culturally diverse and serve the rich communities that live within Auckland. I commend this bill to the House.

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to address this Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill. New Zealand First considered this bill carefully, and we did note that the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act 2008 threw up some inconsistencies in terms of tax treatments and conflicts in terms of the charities involved having to file under different accounting standards. I won’t traverse those, because the previous speakers have covered that at some length, but I did note there’s a wide and quite eclectic mix of charities in these Auckland amenities: the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, WaterSafe Auckland, Surf Life Saving Northern Region, and something called the Stardome, which I’m not familiar with. We don’t have a Stardome in Lawrence; nor do we have a surf lifesaving club or a philharmonic orchestra. We do have a pub, though, so all is not lost. But this bill does make life easier for these charities, and I think that’s worthy of the member bringing it forward. Just in passing, we did note that the Hon Paul Goldsmith passed an amendment to the Charities Act that came into force in 2015 without spotting this anomaly, which means that we’re here today having to take up the House’s time clearing this up.

I won’t take too much longer. I know the House is looking very much forward to Darroch Ball’s Protection for First Responders and Prison Officers Bill, and, of course, we’ll be building to a crescendo later in the night, when the New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income (Fair Residency) Amendment Bill comes before the House under my name. But I will commend the member, Dr Parmjeet Parmar, for bringing this forward. It is a good and important local issue for those nine charities that are affected by this, so I do commend her for bringing it forward and congratulate her for what looks like successfully bringing this forward. I thank the Governance and Administration Committee for the work that they do. This looks like it has been a little bit of a technical bill. I’m glad I didn’t have to trawl through the accounting details that would have been involved in that, but New Zealand First, without further ado, will support this bill. Thank you.

Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. It is an absolute privilege to stand here to contribute to this very important bill for Auckland. It may have been technically small for everybody else, but it is important for Auckland: the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill.

I just want to take this opportunity to thank the sponsor of this bill, Dr Parmjeet Parmar. I hope to receive the same support that I am offering to her sponsored bill when I have mine in the House, so I look forward to that, and congratulations there. I didn’t get it for the language, but I am always looking positively to the future.

Last week was the National Volunteer Week. I know that we’re talking about groups who are mainly made up of volunteers, and I just want to acknowledge all the volunteers out there in New Zealand but, in particular, New Zealand has more than 230,000 volunteers in 27,000 registered charities. The Surf Life Saving Northern Region is part of the amenities group that we are talking about. In that spiel, since I am acknowledging volunteers, I just want to have a shout-out to Rosemary and the team at Sustainable Papakura. I thank you for the acknowledging of local volunteers on Sunday. It was an excellent idea, and I was glad I was there to join volunteers making mosaics.

In that spiel, I just want to remind people what the principal Act is. So the purpose of the principal Act is, first, to establish the mechanism to provide grants in education, rescue, or community facilities for or services to the Auckland region, and the second purpose is to ensure that the Auckland Council is part of the mechanism and, therefore, contributes to the funding.

In my other life, I used to be a treasurer for P.A.C.I.F.I.C.A. Inc. That’s a Pacific Island women’s group established in 1976, and I used to be the treasurer. When that role comes up, nobody puts their hand up. Nobody puts there hand up because the amount of paperwork that charities have to do is just ridiculous.

So I heard from the member for Mt Roskill, and what I took from his speech—Michael Wood, the MP for Mt Roskill. What I got from his kōrero was that this is about setting up the path going forward and making it easier for organisations in—let me say it again; English is my second language, and I’ll try and say it again—the Auckland regional amenities funding group. It will give them an opportunity to make the paperwork fair.

I heard him talk about the—what is it? The velodrome—what’s that name again?

💬 Priyanca Radhakrishnan: The Stardome.

The Stardome in Mt Roskill, and I heard him talk—

💬 Hon Member: It’s in Maungakiekie.

Actually, it’s in Maungakiekie. I should know; I only live down the road. I’ve always admired that Stardome and I want to acknowledge the Stardome for their work.

But can I just remind everybody of the nine groups that we are talking about today. [Interruption] Those groups—I’m just getting to it. Thank you, Marja Lubeck—just let me get to it. I want to acknowledge in particular the Auckland Theatre Co., the Auckland rescue helicopter. I did speak about the funding that we provided in terms of the work the volunteers do, and I want to acknowledge the $2 million from the Hon Poto Williams that went towards water safety, because WaterSafe Auckland, or Drowning Prevention Auckland, is one of the groups.

The Auckland Arts Festival, the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra—and I would like to invite them to come to Papakura. I am the Labour list MP based in Papakura, and I would like to invite them to come over to South Auckland, anywhere—Papakura is part of South Auckland—to hold orchestra events in Maraetai, Whitford, Hunua, Karaka, Kingseat, Ramarama, Ararimu, Brookby, or Kawakawa Bay. Come over—come over to Papakura, because we are also part of Auckland.

As a Tongan New Zealander, I’m very proud to acknowledge Auckland. As the member for Tāmaki Makaurau, the Hon Peeni Henare, spoke fondly of Auckland and of Tāmaki Makaurau, I’ve been a resident of Tāmaki Makaurau since I arrived here in New Zealand in 1980. Of course, it is the city of love, and we want to acknowledge the groups that I have acknowledged, but I want to continue acknowledging the Auckland Rescue Helicopter Trust, the surf life saving—as I’ve said before—and, of course, I keep forgetting the Stardome Observatory is in Maungakiekie. It’s in Maungakiekie, where our list MP Priyanca Radhakrishnan is based.

I remember at the second reading that I took an opportunity to contribute to the second reading, and many speakers did say that it’s a small, technical bill. Although it is a small, technical bill, I know, like the member for Mt Roskill said, that it makes it a little fairer. It makes it a little fairer and easier for these amenities. It makes changes that require specific groups to prepare financial statements, and I want to acknowledge the role of the board in terms of distributing those funds to the nine amenities that have been clearly, clearly acknowledged by our group here.

I want to go back to National Volunteer Week last week, and I want to acknowledge the work of the Papakura Marae. As I said, I am the list member of Parliament based in Papakura, and many times Papakura Marae does a lot of volunteer—the majority of the work done at the marae is about volunteering, and I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge whāea Anne Kendall and the work of Papakura Marae, especially on Thursdays, when those warm meals are cooked for the community. I want to say that—

💬 Marja Lubeck: During COVID?

Oh, during COVID, Papakura Marae was one of the centres that distributed the emergency food parcels, and also they were from the Takanini Sikh temple. I want to acknowledge them in terms of their leadership, but let me get back to this bill.

I want to, again, commend the member on her bill, and the—

💬 Priyanca Radhakrishnan: The select committee.

—select committee. Yeah, I’m getting to that, thank you, Priyanca Radhakrishnan. I want to commend the member for this bill and for her leadership on this bill, and, of course, I heard Dr Jian Yang speak on this bill. The members of the Governance and Administration Committee were Ginny Andersen, Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi, Sarah Dowie, and Paul Eagle was also a member who worked on this bill, and the Hon Peeni Henare, like I said, and I’m still looking for Lawrence Yule—I can’t find him. But I just want to take this opportunity to thank—[Interruption] Oh, there he is. There he is. Oh, thank you—thank you. I’m acknowledging your contribution as members on the select committee that deliberated over this bill.

💬 Marja Lubeck: He should take a call.

Oh, he should take a call—Lawrence Yule. Oh, Marja Lubeck would like you to take a call, Lawrence.

It is a small technicality, but it will, like I said before, make life easier for these groups. It will make life easier for these groups.

Just before I end my speech, I want to take this opportunity, again, to commend the Prime Minister for her leadership throughout COVID-19. Everywhere I am in Papakura, when I’m walking around speaking with people in the community, they want to say a couple of things, actually. They want to say to me, “Anahila, when you’re in Parliament, could you please say to the Prime Minister that we thank her, as part of a team of 5 million, for her leadership. We thank Dr Ashley Bloomfield for his leadership, and we support the way that the Government has looked after New Zealand—all of the 5 million—keeping us safe.”

Of course, now, we have the strictest regime in—there’s no playbook for it. We have the strictest controls at the border, where we test on the third day and we have a second test, and after 14 days of isolation—

💬 Dan Bidois: What does this have to do with the bill?

—with a negative test, you are now able to go home.

I come back to the bill, and I want to again, for the third time, acknowledge the sponsor, Dr Parmjeet Parmar. I want to commend this bill, the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill, to the House. Kia ora.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise to speak to any bill in this House that has as unanimous support as this one. And others have said the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill is a technical bill, but it is important, and it’s especially—of course—important for Auckland, my home.

It is important to stop and acknowledge, of course, our charities and all of the volunteers and people that put in all of the heart and the soul and the blood, sweat, and tears, day in and day out. The previous speaker pointed out the numbers, and it’s astounding. We’ve got 230,000 volunteers that keep our charities going here in New Zealand, and they do that work well. They do it expertly, they are experts in their sectors, they’ve been doing it for years and years. They work in domestic and sexual violence, in child poverty, in the arts and music, and we owe them a lot in our communities. But that work is made so much harder by all of the accounting and the red tape and all the admin that they also have to do, which none of us are particularly expert at necessarily, and it does take away from their capacity to deliver on the services that they actually do want to deliver on and they have the expertise to deliver on.

So we had Charities Week last week, and the Green Party welcomes anything that celebrates the people that are at the grassroots of our communities, doing that work, that are focused on the level of the community that we, often, as parliamentarians can become alienated from unless we do turn our minds deliberately to it, unless we go down there and we do the work ourselves, of collecting for example—and most of us do that for charities. But it is really important to stop and think about the grassroots in this House.

So we do commend this bill. What it does is it takes away from the nonsensical double-up of accounting regulation and requirements that charities have to do. So it was an important bill to bring, and I do thank the member who has brought it, Dr Parmjeet Parmar, and the select committee for processing it and having it shepherded through this House. It’s a tidy-up bill, and we’ve got a lot more of those to do, but it is important and I think it’ll make a significant difference for all of the people who’ve been spending their time, instead of delivering on the services that they are passionate about, doing extra accounting. So I commend the bill to the House.

It’s a pleasure to speak to this bill—another one where there is universal agreement across the House. It’s actually a very simple piece of legislation, but it is important, because we sat at select committee and we listened to the double-up of financial reporting standards, the requirement for people to spend extra effort, money, time, and resources in meeting two standards when, fundamentally, only one standard is required. We also heard at the select committee that a number of the filings of returns were technically probably illegal and they needed to be tidied up. So this bill has some sort of retrospective parts to it which make that right.

It’s clear that the entities—the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, the New Zealand Opera, Auckland Theatre Company, Auckland Arts Festival, Stardome Observatory, Coastguard Northern Region, Surf Life Saving Northern Region, Watersafe Auckland, and Auckland Rescue Helicopter Trust—are all entities that are vitally important to the people of Auckland. I want to congratulate Dr Parmjeet Parmar on bringing this to the House, on showing the initiative, on turning up to the select committee every time you were requested, arguing your case. And I also want to congratulate Dr Parmar on the interactions she had with officials as part of this, because there is a very technical side of two types of accounting standards that are required, but all of us on the select committee could see, through the advocacy of Dr Parmar, that this was a very much needed but relatively simple thing to do, and nobody should stand in its way.

I acknowledge and support the comments of the last speaker, Golriz Ghahraman, who said this is really quite a good piece of legislation, we all agree with it, and it makes common sense. It does sort of surprise me, though, that we can pass some piece of legislation—or perhaps it doesn’t surprise me, based on the last month. But, generally, we should be able to see these things, when accounting standards or other things are changed—changes that are made to the Charities Act, changes that are made to different accounting standards.

So, in a nutshell, this is a common-sense solution to a problem. We’ve taken away a lot of grief and cost and anxiety for the people that run these entities, and we’ve at last made them legal. These are good entities, much loved by the people of Auckland, important to the people of Auckland, and now we’ve allowed them to operate in a legal fashion, and, importantly, we’ve given some retrospective approval—unusual in this place, I know; retrospective approval—to mean that all their actions in the past have now been legal. I commend this bill to the House.

Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. As an Auckland-based MP, it has been a privilege to see this bill progress through the House. As other members have done in their contributions today, can I also just acknowledge the member in whose name this bill is, Dr Parmjeet Parmar, for the work that she’s put in to shepherd the bill to where it is today. Also, as others have said, this is a bill that makes a pretty small and technical fix, but it is one that will make life fairer for the nine specified amenities who will be impacted by the change that it makes.

So I just wanted to—I’m not going to read out all the names of the amenities, because many others have done that, but I do want to acknowledge them though, because they do provide a huge amount, a significant contribution, to the arts, culture, and heritage space—for example, the Auckland Philharmonia Trust and the Auckland Theatre Company. There’s the New Zealand Opera as well.

There’s the Auckland Festival Trust. That’s actually a really interesting one that I just want to draw the House’s attention to, because we know that Auckland is one of the most culturally diverse cities in the world, both in terms of the ethnic community populations that Auckland houses, in a sense, but also I’ve heard it being described as the Polynesian capital of the world as well. One of the things I was really interested to discover, when I looked into the Auckland Festival Trust, is that Auckland had the largest festival that, I guess, celebrated the arts in the Asia-Pacific from 1948 to 1982—so really early on. That festival was started so that Auckland could celebrate its unique position in the Pacific and also as Asian communities grew in the city as well. In the year 2000, the Auckland City Council decided to sort of reinvent that festival, and it took on a life of its own from there.

Just very quickly, the other organisation that I wanted to draw some attention to is Drowning Prevention Auckland, which was WaterSafe Auckland. They have stated that in the past five years, of the 93 preventable drownings they’ve had, 27 percent of that was in the Asian or other category. As someone who engages broadly with our diverse communities in Auckland, I know that many, especially new, migrants and refugees come from countries that are landlocked, and so they haven’t had the opportunity to go through water-safety education programmes. That’s what Drowning Prevention Auckland does through a specific programme called New to New Zealand. So I just want to commend them for that work as well.

I just want to quickly draw Mark Patterson’s attention to the Stardome, because he specifically made a point that he didn’t know what it was about. Given that it’s in the Maungakiekie electorate, that I’m based in, I just wanted to say to the member that there are some really exciting shows that he should catch the next time he’s in Auckland, particularly Music & Lights, which my colleague Michael Wood has talked about already, where, if you’re over 18, you get a glass of wine, you sit back and relax in reclining chairs, and you watch psychedelic images on the dome ceiling as they dance to the music of Pink Floyd. What could be better on a Tuesday night? Also, given that it’s Matariki coming up, they’ve got a programme called Ngā Whetū O Matariki, where you’ve got a live presenter-led Matariki kōrero under the planetarium stars, where you learn about the many stories written in our night skies and passed down from generation to generation.

So absolutely wonderful work that these nine specified amenities do. What this bill will do is to make changes that require these specified amenities to prepare financial statements just in accordance with one set of reporting standards rather than the two that they have been required to report to since 2015. So it’s an anomaly that this bill fixes. These amenities do amazing work across various sectors in Auckland, and I just want to commend that and also to commend everyone who’s put in incredibly hard work to get this bill to where it is today. So I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you very much for the chance to speak on this private bill under Dr Parmjeet Parmar’s name. Thank you, Dr Parmar, for picking this particular piece of legislation up. We realise that you’ve had a very special connection with Stardome Observatory and Planetarium, as the list MP based in Mt Roskill. It is now a great privilege that it has come back into the Maungakiekie electorate.

There’s been a few members of the House mention that particular charity, but, of course, there are nine in this bill, and I well remember, as a former city councillor, listening to all nine come in to Auckland Council, as they do on an annual basis, to update us on the work that they were doing, given that Auckland Council is part of the administration of the funding that goes out to them. I’m going to read out their names deliberately, Madam Speaker, not to kill time, I assure you, but because they genuinely deserve the creds, and the saying out loud of who they are and what they do. You only need sit, as I did on an annual basis, and listen to the work that they do. Any one of those organisations deserves incredible recognition for their work: Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, New Zealand Opera, the Auckland Theatre Company, Auckland Arts Festival, Stardome, which I’ve already mentioned, Coastguard Northern Region, Surf Life Saving Northern Region, Auckland Rescue Helicopter Trust, and WaterSafe Auckland and Drowning Prevention Auckland—the merger of them.

What’s interesting about this bill is that normally when you’re looking at funding regimes, you’ll be possibly looking at total operating expenses or total revenue when it comes to funding. But this, of course, is a cap of rates revenue, 2 percent of rates revenue—not all revenue but of rates revenue. And I think it’s interesting, the restraint that’s shown, because technically these organisations are allowed up to a maximum, if we look at the 2019-20 fiscal year, of $34.3 million, and instead their funding envelope has been $15.5 million. I’m sure they’d like to get their hands on the remainder of that available funding, as per legislation. But what we’ve seen, as I just mentioned, is a really heart-warming process of all nine incredible charities doing their best to put their best foot forward in terms of funding. And that’s exactly what Dr Parmar has done here: put her foot forward for these charities to make sure that their life’s a little easier, and a little easier as per regulations and accounting practices.

We support this on this side of the House. We thank all nine charities for the work that they do, and we look forward to hearing of all their good work in the future. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I’ve been wanting to give this speech about the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Board and the Act for about 10 years. I saw this was on when I was a sitting in my office, so I thought I’d come down and have a small speech on it. I’m going to swim against the tide. I know that that’s not like me to not conform with what others in the House are doing, but I’m going to do this on this particular speech.

See, I listened to the speech from Michael Wood. He gave a good one. He gave good background around the Act. It has its genesis back in the mid-2000s when these amenities used to front up at every city council and every district council around Auckland and beg, cap in hand, for money from the councils. I was on the Manukau City Council for the six years prior to amalgamation, and it’s fair to say we were pretty stingy. We all thought, “Well, the Auckland City Council’s going to fund the bulk of it. They always have; they always will.” So we were pretty careful with how much we would give the particular amenities.

In the dying days of the Helen Clark Labour Government—you may remember it, Madam Speaker—Judith Tizard came up with the idea of having a piece of legislation to force all the other councils in Auckland to fund these amenities. It was probably a good idea at the time, because these amenities were struggling for funding. The Auckland City Council and Auckland ratepayers were having to front up and fund the bulk of them, when actually these amenities serviced the whole of Auckland. So 2008 comes along. The Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act is put in place.

The other councils, of which I was a member, we kicked and screamed and we hated it, because we didn’t like Parliament telling us that we had to fund something that we didn’t want to. And there were all these mechanisms put in place. There was a funding board and there was an electoral college, and the councils had no choice about how much they would fund. They would just be told what the funding was going to be, and if there was an issue there was arbitration, but we never went through that because what was the point? In fact, no, actually, I remember Peter Salmon acted as an arbitrator once, because we did disagree as an electoral college on how much the amenities should be funded. Even though we had this legislation, we were still too stingy with how much we wanted to fund, and so it ended up going to arbitration. We probably spent, you know, many, many tens of thousands of dollars on the arbitrator, only to end up in exactly the same position.

But then 2010 came along and the Auckland Council was formed, and it removed all of the city and district councils that sat in Auckland. I thought to myself at the time that it was going to remove the need for this Regional Amenities Funding Board, because rather than having multiple layers between the council and the amenities, there’s not going to be those multiple layers needed any more, because the amenities could simply front up straight to the Auckland Council. But what did Parliament do? It was a change of Government by that point. Rodney Hide—I would have thought the man who is against red tape and against bureaucracy would have proposed that this funding board be abolished, but he didn’t. The Auckland Council was created. The amenities had the ability to speak directly to the funder, but Parliament decided to keep the funding board in place.

The funding board does nothing except move money from the council through to the amenities. All it does is meet a couple of times a year to hear how much the amenities want, and then it decides to tell the council how much they have to fund. There’s still the arbitration process if the council disagrees, but the people who make the decisions about how much Aucklanders should be rated don’t get to decide how much money goes to these amenities, because Parliament still says there has to be a law in place because Parliament doesn’t trust the Auckland Council on how much it should fund these important amenities.

Now, the Auckland festival, the Philharmonia, the rescue helicopter, the theatre company—they’re important for Auckland, but we should be trusting the council to fund them directly. We don’t need this board any more. There is no need for the board to be in place. There’s no need for Parliament to say: Auckland Council, you must fund an amount of money.

Now, I’m sure this amendment bill we have right now is going to make it easy. It’s going to remove some of the funding requirements—no, make it easier for the amenities by removing some of the red tape that’s in place. They don’t have to prepare two sets of statements in line with two different accounting practices. But the easier solution to solve their problem would have been just to repeal the Act entirely and get rid of the funding board. Those members there, there’s 10 of them—there’s district councils around the country with far bigger budgets, with fewer members. There’s 10 members on this funding board. They get paid between $16,000 and $30,000 a year to do nothing but tell the council how much money the council should fund the amenities. It’s ridiculous and it’s unnecessary.

So, I say to the House, yes, this legislation does do something good, and I suppose I should praise, in obligatory fashion, Parmjeet Parmar for bringing this bill to the House—good on you, Parmjeet Parmar—but there’s no need for this legislation. We should be abolishing the funding board and saying, “Thanks for your service for 10 years or 12 years. You didn’t really need to do much for the last 10.”, but Parliament does still have this piece of legislation in place. The previous councils weren’t funding them properly, and good on Parliament for doing the right thing at the time, but there’s no need any more for this funding bill. There’s no need any more for the board to sit there and do nothing but shuffle money and drag out $350,000 in admin costs just for the privilege of sitting there.

I know there’ll be passionate people, I know they will care deeply about the amenities, but the Auckland councillors that fund them will care about those amenities, too. So I suggest these amenities, which could quite easily front up directly to the council and ask for the money, could do so without having the middleman of the funding board in place. The nice idea of Judith Tizard was a nice idea at the time, but it’s now unnecessary.

I will support the bill, because it does do something good to make it easier for the amenities, but we don’t need this bureaucracy. As a former city councillor who didn’t entirely like the fact that we were forced, through this funding board, to pay money to the amenities when we could have made our own decisions, I still harbour some of those grievances and I wanted to express them here in this House. They’re no longer necessary and we should just be repealing the Act in its entirety.

It’s a pleasure to rise and take a call at this third and final reading of this bill, the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Amendment Bill. I must say, I’ve never seen so many members of the Government benches give so many full call speeches in the House today. Is something going on or are they trying to filibuster their own members’ bills here in the House? But never mind, we digress.

This is a really good bill, and I do want to take time out to acknowledge my colleague Dr Parmjeet Parmar for raising this issue. It is a really important issue, and, in particular, at a time like this when a lot of our community organisations—

💬 Hon Willie Jackson: Put her on the front bench.

Yes, Willie Jackson—a lot of our community organisations are under pressure in a post-COVID world. They’re under pressure financially, and the last thing they need to do is prepare a duplicate set of financial statements just to satisfy the legislative requirements.

So Dr Parmjeet Parmar has found a fantastic way to help relieve them of their pressure—some of their compliance pressure—by removing the need to comply with the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) based accounts, and instead you can just go and comply with the GAAP: the general accounting accord practices—

💬 Michael Wood: Generally accepted accounting practice.

Generally accepted; there you go. Thank you, Michael Wood, for correcting me on that. There’s somebody that’s knowledgable in this area.

But I do just want to say to you—

💬 Rt Hon David Carter: Be a cynic.

That’s right. I do want to say to you that, look, as I said, this is really important in a post-COVID environment. We’ve got to make sure we support our many community organisations. There are some fantastic organisations, many of which have been traversed today: the New Zealand Opera, the surf life saving, the rescue helicopter, the water safe and drowning prevention in northern region, and the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra. These are fantastic organisations who employ people and who look after the beating heart of our communities in Auckland. So all I want to say is I commend this bill to the House; it’s a fantastic way to streamline unnecessary compliance. And the previous member, Jami-Lee Ross, did raise a good point: there is unnecessary burdens in there and we want to remove those where possible.

So, look, I commend this bill to the House. I want to do a special shout-out to everybody in those organisations in Auckland, whether you’re a volunteer or an employee or a staff member: thank you for the fantastic work that you do on behalf of this House, and we salute you from this House. So without further ado, I commend this bill to the Parliament.

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Given the significance of this bill to the people of Auckland, I seek leave of the House that other Auckland-based members in the Chamber be afforded a speaking slot on this bill.

Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is objection.

Bill read a third time.