Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill

I move, That the Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill be now read a second time.

The Auckland Future Fund bill is a significant and forward-looking piece of legislation that will help shape the future of New Zealand’s largest city for generations to come. Auckland is not just our largest urban centre; it is the beating heart of New Zealand economy, culture, and diversity. Home to more than 1.7 million people, around one-third of the country’s population, Auckland’s continued growth affects our national progress, but with that growth comes real and complex challenges: purchase of infrastructure, transportation, environmental concern, and the ongoing needs for sustainable investment. Meeting these challenges requires more than a short-term fix; it demands long-term vision and innovative financial tools. This bill represents precisely that.

Before I go further, I want to sincerely thank the members of the Governance and Administration Committee for their details and for their consideration of this bill. I also want to acknowledge all those who took the time to submit their feedback. Your contribution has played an important role in shaping the legislation before us today.

This bill establishes the Auckland Future Fund, a mechanism to secure growth and protect long-term capital that can be used to support Auckland’s most important needs. It provides Auckland Council with dedicated and enjoined financial assets capable of generating sustainable returns to help address the city’s most pressing challenges, from infrastructure and transport to climate action and housing. It represents a shift in how we think about public finance. Rather than relying solely on rates, debt, or central government funding, the Auckland Future Fund creates a pathway to financial resilience. It gives Auckland Council a tool to invest in the future while insulating it from short-term uncertainty and political pressures.

One of the questions raised during the select committee process was whether a local bill is truly necessary. Auckland Council and the trustee answered this directly in their joint submission. There are two key reasons why legislation is required. First, having a statutory protection gives Aucklanders lasting confidence in the fund’s purpose and governance, unlike council policy or trustees, which can be changed by future councils. Legislation provides enduring safeguards that are not easily altered. This ensures the fund’s integrity over the long term. Second, the bill introduces a higher threshold for key financial decisions. This requires a 75 percent super majority of the council’s governing body to approve certain distribution resolutions. That’s way above the simple majority normally required under the Local Government Act. By setting this high bar, the bill ensures major decisions about the funds are made with board consensus and clear public support, a level of protection only legislation can guarantee.

Another issue raised during the committee process was whether the fund’s investment should be limited to the Auckland region. It’s important to be clear about what the bill does and what it does not. This bill governs how the fund’s capital is invested in generating long-term returns. These decisions are made by independent investment professionals guided by a responsible investment policy adopted under Auckland Council’s long-term plan. That policy, which the trustee must follow, includes environmental, social, governance, and climate change considerations. These are responsible, diversified investments. Restricting them to Auckland alone would reduce this diversification, expose the fund to unnecessary regional risks, and could undermine long-term return and limited performance. It would also conflict with the fund’s responsible investment policy, which is designed to ensure ethical and sustainable investment across sectors and markets.

To be clear, this bill separates investment decisions from how returns are used. Investments are managed independently, but how the income is spent remains a council decision subject to normal consultation requirements. Under section 12 of the Local Government Act, any spending must benefit Auckland. That safeguard remains fully in place and is unaffected by this bill. Clause 9 further ensures that investment decisions are made independently of elected members and their interests. Under existing law, councillors and local board members cannot serve as a director of a council-controlled organisation. This provision reinforces the fund’s independence and safeguards the integrity of its operation.

I want to give the House an update on the fund’s performance to date. In December 2024, the board sold Auckland Council’s shares in Auckland International Airport Limited at $8.08 per share. By comparison, had the sales occurred in late August 2025, when the share price had dropped to $7.60, Auckland would have received $78 million less. That timing protected significant value for ratepayers. Also, between December 2024 and June 2025, the fund delivered a return of 4.06 percent, a strong result in a volatile global market. Over the same period, the S&P 500 rose about 2.5 percent, while Auckland International Airport shares fell by over 7 percent. The income difference is so clear.

In the 2024-25 financial year, the fund generated $38.4 million in distribution income compared to just $10.2 million in dividends that would have come from retaining the airport shares. Combining both the capital value and income, the council is currently around $100 million better off than it would have been without the fund. These are real, measurable gains and clear evidence that the fund is already delivering strong financial outcomes for Aucklanders.

This bill is about more than just sound financial management; it’s about laying the groundwork for the future, where Auckland can meet its challenges with confidence, ambition, and physical resilience. It’s about ensuring our largest city has the tools it needs to invest in infrastructure, deliver housing, protect the environment, and plan for generations to come. It is a bill rooted in responsibility, independence, and public trust. It provides the structure, the safeguards, and the vision required to deliver long-term benefits to the people of Auckland.

Before I conclude, I would like to acknowledge Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown, Councillor Christine Fletcher, Auckland Future Fund chair Christopher Swasbrook, and all the council officers for their contribution. Your engagement has strengthened the legislation and helped shape a better outcome for Auckland.

Finally, I want to emphasise that this fund is not just a financial tool; it’s a commitment to the people of Auckland and future generations. It’s a commitment to the people of Auckland by securing sustainable return and embedding strong governance. The Auckland Future Fund will present a model for responsible stewardship that other regions can look to as they plan for their own future. It’s an investment in resilience, innovation, and the wellbeing of our communities. This bill sends a clear message that Auckland is ready to meet the challenges ahead with confidence and care. I commend the Auckland Future Fund bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Tāmaki-makau-rau. Tāmaki Herehere. Tāmake Herenga Waka. E mihi ana ki ngā mana whenua o Tāmaki-makau-rau me ngā mihi ki Ngāti Whātua ki Ōrakei i tēnei rā. Nōreira tēnā tātou.

[Acknowledgments to the native people of Tāmaki-makau-rau and also to Ngāti Whātua ki Ōrākei today. And so, greetings all.]

Auckland is, or can be, the greatest city that we see in Aotearoa New Zealand. We are bursting with diversity, potential, and life. It can be a city that truly is about all of us, but it has to be about all of us and not leaving anyone behind.

Labour supports this bill and its provision of statutory protection for the Auckland Future Fund. It will help provide Aucklanders with confidence; they can know that it will help current and future councils to invest productively, helping to support our city to grow and to become more and more prosperous. The fund operates as a council-controlled organisation and regional fund under high-level direction from council, but through an independent structure where the trustees board makes key decisions. This is estimated to return 7.24 percent per annum over the long term, with 5.2 percent returned to council as an annual cash distribution, and the rest protecting the real value of the fund. That is approximately $60 million to $70 million per year returned to council from 2026—$70 million that goes back into our greatest city in Aotearoa, and back into the people of Tāmaki-makau-rau.

Many people in the House today, and watching online, will have read the State of the City report. It’s the third rendition and benchmarks our city of Auckland Tāmaki-makau-rau up against other great cities in the world—other great cities—and it tells us how well we’re doing. The neutrality of this report largely talks about productivity, how we do better, how we stay more connected, both through transport but also how we build a society that looks after everyone and ensures that everyone has access to the opportunities of the city that we live in. We know that, in many of these measures, we are going backwards: prosperity, innovation, knowledge, culture, experience, place, connectivity—a big one—resilience, and sustainability. The last one: opportunity.

I moved to Auckland for opportunity—to learn, to get a great job, to do what I do now: to represent people on the North Shore and across Auckland. I love that job, but times are tough for them. The thing is, the promises that this Government made to Aucklanders haven’t been achieved. I cite the article that comes from the Heart of the City survey, which outlines that the business association for Auckland’s city centre has reluctantly released their report; that officers believe that homelessness, too few police, neglect, and disorder—and this is when Government members start to chitter-chatter amongst themselves and heckle—

💬 Hon Judith Collins: No one’s heckling you, honey, because you’re not worth it.

Judith Collins is heckling me right now—

💬 Hon Judith Collins: Don’t bring me into it.

—because homelessness, too few police, Minister—open your ears—and frightening antisocial behaviour are crippling their trade. That’s the realities of Auckland, and so the call for this future fund is the call of Mayor Wayne Brown. This is not a call that’s come from this Government, nor the National Party, nor any Government MPs that represent electorates in Tāmaki-makau-rau Auckland. I acknowledge Mayor Wayne Brown for the work that he’s done, along with his council, to move this Government to take one action—one action—to generate better outcomes for Aucklanders, because the Government has been woeful on real action on the cost of living for Aucklanders. Explain that!

💬 Hon Judith Collins: It’s called interest rates coming down.

Coming down—coming down. The Minister might want to explain to people in Papakura how that tangibly makes a difference in their households in her own community. No change—no change.

The important stuff today in this House is that we get on and move through legislation that actually creates real change to Aucklanders—

💬 Hon Member: Oh, it’s good you’ve realised that, Shanan.

—and this change, in my 10 minutes to have my say—

💬 Hon Member: Only four to go.

—is to talk about the progress that Auckland Council is making and Mayor Wayne Brown. The National Party members and the ACT Party members who are heckling across the other side, I challenge them to step up. Step up and invest in Auckland.

💬 Simon Court: We will.

Your investment in transport has taken us backwards. Where’s your investment in public transport? It’s gone backwards—there’s less. People are paying more for public transport in our city than they ever have in the last two decades.

💬 Simon Court: Wait for my speech. It’s coming.

💬 Cameron Luxton: Shanan Halbert could sit down and we could get to the answers.

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Shanan Halbert still has time left on the clock.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I look forward to the other contributions from members across the House. I hope they understand—

💬 Ryan Hamilton: Back to the bill—back to the bill.

—the needs of Aucklanders and their call for help—

💬 Ryan Hamilton: Three minutes to go.

—particularly the member from Hamilton. When we look at the statistics, National is taking us backwards. We see it in homelessness; we see it in an unemployment rate up to 6.1 percent in the June 2025 quarter, the worst of all regions; increasing food insecurity, as highlighted by Auckland City Mission; the closure of the North Shore Women’s Centre—that’s a big one for our community that we have heard nothing about from North Shore MPs, five of them—

💬 Hon Melissa Lee: Talk to the bill.

—five MPs. I am talking to the bill, because what you’ll understand about the Auckland Future Fund is that it’s about investment in our city—something that you have not done, Government members have not done. It’s time for them to step up and answer the call of our city, of business leaders, of community leaders, and this is a great example of something that can be achieved. When there’s a will, there’s an absolute way. I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I rise to speak in support of the Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill. The Green Party supports this legislation. It’s good legislation. It’s good legislative practice, both in its substance and in the process that brought it here. As a member of the Governance and Administration Committee that examined this bill, I can report that we’ve unanimously recommended that it be passed without amendment. That unanimity reflects both the straightforward nature of this legislation and the quality of the process behind it.

I’ll just say a few words about what this bill does, rather than getting into a Wellington - Auckland competition, which is very tempting. The Green Party, first of all, does not support the sale of assets, but that was done. Auckland Council decided to sell its airport shares. The council chose to commit those proceeds to a dedicated investment fund, and this bill provides the legislative framework to safeguard that fund as a long-term financial asset for the benefit of Tāmaki-makau-rau’s communities, both present and future, and it’s a refreshing change to look a little bit further ahead into the future.

It requires the council to ensure that the fund is governed and managed with the intent of maintaining or increasing its value, and it mandates that investment decisions are made by suitably qualified and formally appointed managers. So it’s sound governance and it’s appropriate financial planning, but it doesn’t lock these resources away without any means of access—it could be in emergencies or various sorts of things that we haven’t even thought about yet.

The council does retain the ability to make distributions from the fund, but only through a very robust process. It requires public consultation through a long-term plan process and a resolution to be passed by at least 75 percent of council members.

Now, that’s the way, in my view, that Minister Goldsmith should have been looking at any changes to voter enrolment. It’s the way that we should have been looking at the purpose of local government. Those are quasi-constitutional issues that should not be decided by a narrow and ephemeral majority. Additionally, council must demonstrate that the proposed distribution will achieve a benefit that is better for current and future communities than just maintaining the capital. These are appropriately high thresholds that balance that sort of flexibility with responsibility.

I also want to highlight something else significant about this bill which is sadly growing rare during this Government. It represents a statement of support for the autonomy of local government. We often see central government imposing rules and unfunded mandates on local authorities, and this bill takes a very different approach. It respects Auckland Council’s decision making. It provides the legislative tools that the council requested to ensure long-term security, and it recognises that Aucklanders, through their elected representatives, are appropriately placed to make decisions about Auckland’s future, not this House.

The Green Party supports the principle that decisions should be made as close as possible to the people they affect—appropriate decision-making. This bill, though modest, embodies that principle. It’s a partnership between central and local government rather than an imposition or a straitjacket from this House.

I also want to briefly address the process that brought this bill before us today. I think every bill that passes through this House should go through that kind of proper select committee scrutiny. We were able to ask the Auckland Council and other submitters some matters of detail about why the legislation was required, what was necessary, and what the changes were that should be made. We were made more confident about the effect of that bill through that thorough scrutiny. There have been far too many bills going through a curtailed process and it will not only have bad effects in the community but it will waste time in the next Parliament when we could be working constructively.

I just want to note that this bill’s probably unanimous passing should be a more frequent occurrence in this House. If we have the same aims as are often expressed in this House about the future wellbeing of our communities—economic, environmental, social, and cultural—then we would do better to work together and have more shared legislation.

There were legitimate questions raised about the local bill process, but in this case, given the Auckland Future Fund’s significance and the confidence that this fund will offer Aucklanders, we agreed that a local bill was justified. I want to thank Auckland Council, I want to thank Dr Carlos Cheung for bringing forward this bill, and I thank the Governance and Administration Committee members for a collegial and thorough process. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. Firstly, I want to acknowledge the member Dr Carlos Cheung, from Mt Roskill in Auckland, the member who’s brought the Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill. Congratulations, Carlos. Your bill will succeed. You’ve put in a lot of hard work, and Aucklanders now and Aucklanders in the future will thank you for this.

I also want to acknowledge the courage of Auckland Council in the face of the regressive forces which say, “No matter what assets you’ve got, whether they’re performing well or badly, you should never sell them. Assets should always remain stashed in a cupboard under the stairs or at the back of the garage because they’re assets.” That makes no sense. Auckland Council has seen sense that recycling assets and transferring the capital into an arrangement that can earn a better rate of return and, potentially, if they make more courageous decisions, lead to the deployment of that capital into new infrastructure that produces economic growth and makes Auckland a better place to live. If they can show that kind of courage, then the outcome from this Auckland Future Fund will be dramatic for Auckland.

That’s going to take a commitment. It’s going to take, as I said, courage. It’s also going to take some significant planning and weighing up of priorities, because, boy, oh boy, I’m an Aucklander and I can tell you there’s a lot of infrastructure lacking. We’ve got waste water overflowing into our harbour in places like—where I live, in Te Atatū Peninsula—Henderson Creek. Here’s one of my Te Atatū mates—Phil Twyford—who’s just joined us today. He knows what I’m talking about. We’ve got transport issues. The city’s going to grow by another million people, and I can tell you that despite those who would say, “You could just get out of your car and walk. You could just take a bike. We’ll put on more buses. We’ll tell you what: we’ll take out the car parks, and we’ll create bus and bike lanes. You can catch a bus.”, with a million more Aucklanders coming to live in Auckland, they are not going to catch a bus and ride a bike. They are going to need to drive their cars on roads.

That is why, in addition to all the other things that Auckland Council already has on its list—there’s a $4 billion shortfall between the infrastructure it knows it needs to fund and the amount of money it can get from ratepayers—it also is going to have to turn its mind to another million people coming, according to the Auckland plan. We’re going to have to increase the capacity of our existing and new roads by at least 60 to 80 percent to deal with the growth. That must sound like Armageddon to the Green Party. I’m sure that Julie Anne Genter would be having an absolute meltdown if she was here right now, but, in fact, growth demands infrastructure, and it’s not always the infrastructure that we like.

How did this infrastructure deficit occur, and how will the Auckland Future Fund help deal with that? Well, for many, many decades, Auckland Council and its predecessors have had a “Maybe if we don’t plan the infrastructure, maybe the growth won’t happen” approach. That’s not reality. Auckland has grown. It’s a very attractive city to live in—I’ve lived there most of my life—and it’s attracting more and more people who want to share in the benefits. There are thousands of kilometres of coastline. There’s the Hauraki Gulf marine protection areas—we’re going to restore the gulf. There are so many good recreation opportunities—not to mention jobs and manufacturing, high tech, and finance. There are so many good reasons to move to Auckland.

But we have an infrastructure deficit caused by an anti-growth council over many years, poor planning, and, of course, poor financial management. I’ll give you an example of poor financial management: every week in Auckland, trucks go round and round the city intending to pick up a tiny little bin of food scraps. Auckland Council said that every household must have this bin. They must put all their vegetable peelings in this tiny little bin, and they must put it on the kerbside every week. They bought a fleet of trucks to pick it up. Now, I’ll tell you what: most households don’t bother putting out that bin. They’ve got another plastic bin they’ve probably used to store something useful, like the plastic bags that they’ve hidden from the “plastic bag police” that they can still keep under the kitchen bench at home. It’s projects like that that have cost half a billion dollars or more, wasting Auckland ratepayers’ money and that have led to the situation where Auckland’s run out of money for infrastructure.

By selling the airport shares and transferring those funds into the Auckland Future Fund, that actually provides money to be spent on infrastructure we might need. What could Auckland Council spend it on? Well, in their regional land transport plan, they’ve identified public transport and other infrastructure that needs funding. They don’t have the money. Of course, the City Rail Link is near completion, and there are over a dozen level crossings approaching the city from the west and from the south and some to the east, but, because the road traffic and the trains meet at the level crossing, you can’t actually increase the frequency of trains and move more passengers through the City Rail Link unless you separate the rail lines from the road. Well, that was never planned or funded by the previous Labour Government or the previous ex-Labour mayor, Phil Goff.

Now, we have potentially another decade of disruption and billions of dollars that need to be spent on funding the grade separation on the Auckland train network, before we can start to see even the first meagre returns from the Crown’s $6 billion or so investment in the City Rail Link. There’s been poor planning, poor financial management, and a lack of courage, and it’s, basically, a “Maybe if we don’t plan for it, they won’t come” council. Well, this Government has committed to the City Rail Link projects and put down around $200 million for the first stage of grade separation in some of those really important parts of the network out in South Auckland. But, of course, you’ve got Kingsland, and then you’ve got Morningside and Sandringham all the way out west where Auckland’s intended to grow. If we don’t do the grade separation, the city will literally grind to a halt.

What about supporting growth outside of the city? Well, we have a supporting growth programme, which is an alliance between central government, Auckland Council, and Auckland Transport. It’s intended to deliver the infrastructure to allow the northwest of Auckland, places like Kumeū—near where I live in West Auckland—to actually grow and meet their potential. Every day, 15,000 vehicles—including heavy trucks and freight and stock trucks—trundle down the main street of Kumeū and the neighbouring town of Huapai on their way to and from Auckland City. That traffic volume is only going to increase. Hundreds of thousands of people are intending to live there. That land is zoned future urban and future commercial. None of it can be enabled. None of those homes can be delivered without the enabling infrastructure, such as a four-lane bypass around the little town of Kumeū, which, if that bypass goes in, will be able to grow and flourish just like other towns are when bypasses go in. Think of the Kāpiti Coast. Think of all of those towns that benefit from Transmission Gully and that are now able to grow. Kids can walk to school safely. All of these benefits are available if we put a bypass in. Northwest Kumeū deserves a bypass. Maybe the Auckland Future Fund could be allocated to that kind of project.

There are similar issues in Pukekohe and around the city. That’s before we get to the massive deficit in stormwater infrastructure. The fact is that large parts of Auckland are subject to flooding when, really, they shouldn’t be. It turns out the teeny-weeny little pipes they put in in the 90s, 70s, and 80s can’t cope with the tens of thousands more homes that have been built in those places those pipes were never built to service. We’ve got a huge stormwater deficit. Telling Aucklanders we’re going to take your golf course away and turn it into a wetland isn’t going to be the answer for everything. That’s before we get to the need to build our resilience against weather and other natural hazards, because, of course, Auckland is in the path of cyclones, like so many other parts of New Zealand, but a million and a half people live there. We really, really need to make sure that coastal defences, sea walls, and all of those things that protect our assets, protect our roads, and protect community facilities are actually funded and delivered.

I’m proud and the ACT Party is proud to support the Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill to progress, to pass into legislation, and to be given effect, too. I also want to make it very clear that Auckland Council is on notice. The future elected members of Auckland Council will need to be courageous and take decisions that mobilise this fund into impactful investments, otherwise all this effort that proud Dr Carlos Cheung has put into it will be wasted. Go, Auckland Council! Get on with it!

What a fascinating speech to follow on from! Look, I wanted to start off by congratulating—

💬 Hon Member: No money for Wellington.

I’m going to mention Wellington later on—tale of two cities.

I just wanted to start off by congratulating Dr Carlos Cheung, my good friend there, for your sponsorship of this bill. I also wanted to congratulate the Auckland Council because they brought this bill to the House. They didn’t have to do it, but they brought this, and I think it’s a matter of great responsibility on their behalf to safeguard this Auckland Future Fund. They’d already established this Auckland Future Fund before coming to the House, so they didn’t have to do this. What they’ve done is said, “We want to wrap some extra rules and controls around this so that future councils cannot spend that money too easily.”

It was fascinating listening to Simon Court there. I think he probably spent the fund about a hundred times over! What we’re talking about here is the ability to spend some of the income from the fund, not to be able to dip into the fund itself, unless you generally have a real emergency that the Auckland Council, by a 75 percent majority, have said, “Actually, we do think it’s more important to be able to spend some of that money to run down some of that capital, and to keep growing that money.” It might make $40 million, $50 million a year, that’s going to be a significant benefit, but it’s not going to pay for all of those things—and certainly not all the things that Simon Court was talking about—in a short period of time. It might contribute to them over a longer period of time; that will be a significant contribution.

I just wanted, also, to credit Auckland Council—because I’ve been given a little bit of a serve there—not only for their responsibility in bringing this legislation to the House but also for their responsibility in the way in which they are managing their finances and their rate increases. I would note that of all the big metropolitan councils in the country, their rates increase over the last two years is the smallest. The one thing we hear from ratepayers all across the country at the moment is their concern about rates levies. Auckland Council: last year, 6.8 percent on the residential rates; this year, 5.8. They’re not tiny rate increases, but they are the smallest of the big metropolitan centres, and some of the smallest in the country. So I want to congratulate them for that.

The money that’s made up this Auckland Future Fund has been from the sale of shares in Auckland Airport and, of course, the various constituent parts of what is now the Auckland Council—so the Waitākeres, the North Shores, and Auckland Councils, and so on. They all had shares in Auckland Airport, and they’ve been progressively sold. This was the last big chunk of those. Of course, the Crown itself sold its shareholding probably—what?—20, 25 years ago, I think it was. That means good, logical sense to say, “Instead of having a large chunk of our money in one asset, Finance Management 101 basically says ‘You diversify your assets’.” That is what the Auckland Future Fund is about. It’s about giving this in a controlled way to professional financial managers to manage a fund to achieve at least the kind of return that you were getting from the shares in Auckland Airport, and, probably, at the moment, a greater return from those shares. So it’s a diversification proposition.

It is not a spending proposition. It is not saying “We have sold these shares, and now we’re going to sell them.” Because the shares, of course, are in Auckland Airport. Auckland Airport represents something which has been built up as an asset over a very, very long period of time by the owners of that asset: the Crown, the councils, and, more latterly, private shareholders as well.

In fact, we heard about the investment in City Rail Link in Auckland, that’s a huge investment that’s been made, but, actually, by dollar numbers, the biggest investment in the country at the moment—and I think it probably will be the biggest investment in nominal dollar terms ever in New Zealand—is the redevelopment of Auckland Airport. Air New Zealand might not be entirely happy with the scale of that, but that is the nature of that. It is a very significant investment.

The establishment of the Auckland Future Fund is about not spending that long-developed asset, that long-developed amount of money quickly; it’s about saying that it was built up by past generations and it will be available to continue to provide benefit to today’s generations but also to future generations. The whole idea of wrapping that fund around with this legislation which we’re talking about at the moment is to say to councils that there is a discipline on you that you cannot simply go and raid the piggy bank; you have to do that in a careful and measured way. I think that shows great responsibility on behalf of the current Auckland Council, who have said to the Government—to the Parliament, actually, not to the Government; to the Parliament, “Can you pass this piece of legislation?”

I’d also make the point that the fund is worth about $1.3 billion, and, actually, there’s been an addition to that fund as well. There was a special dividend from another asset of the Auckland Council, that is the Ports of Auckland. They declared not only their normal dividend but also their special dividend of $45 million. That has gone also into the Auckland Future Fund, and that came from the sale of their shares in Marsden Maritime Holdings up in the Northport area.

The idea, as I said, is that this fund will be run by appropriately skilled investment professionals—not by politicians; by appropriately skilled investment professionals. They will make sure that there’s properly diversified, proper good returns, there will be asset sales and purchases and so on, as any good professional manager would do.

This fund represents, as I said, the assets which have been built up over a long period of time and it’s something that follows the model that has also been established by the New Plymouth Council. So they have also got a very similar kind of fund. I can see you nodding, Madam Speaker, because you’re well aware of this. So that, again, is another council which has said, “We have a set of assets, we want to sell those, we want to put that into a fund for the benefit of future generations which inhabit this particular part of the country.”

I did want to contrast that with another council very close to here, which looked—I told you it was going to be a tale of two cities in this particular bit—to sell shares in its airport, and that’s the Wellington City Council. They made a complete hash of it. Unlike Auckland—where Auckland said, “We are going to sell these shares.”, they went out and consulted on that and they said, “We are going to put the proceeds of that into a fund. We’re going to lock it away and hold it for future benefit.”—the Wellington Council, in contrast, in part said, “Oh, we’re going to sell those shares and then we’re going to use it to invest in a whole bunch of pieces of various assets of various sorts, kind of now.”, which would have of course run up their debt and, then, would also have had lots of costs ongoing.

The people of Wellington weren’t particularly keen on that proposition because they said, “Well, look, you’re going to sell an asset which earns revenue and makes a significant contribution to the funds of Wellington, which offsets rates, and you’re going to propose to sell that and transfer that into assets which do not earn revenue; in fact, cost you more.” So, quite logically, Wellingtonians were going, “Oh, hang on. I don’t particularly like that.”

They made that worse by, in some parts, saying, “We’re going to put it into those kinds of assets.”; other councillors saying, “We’re not going to put it into that; we’re going to lock it away.” I think, in the Wellington case, unlike the clarity that Auckland managed to deliver, they got everything completely confused. So, in the first place, they said they were going to sell; they then decided they weren’t going to sell; they then managed to be the only council in the country that that managed to torpedo their entire long-term plan; they then became the only council in the country which ended up an observer.

So it’s an example in Auckland—tale of one city—of how to do it right, and an example in Wellington—tale of another city—of how to do it completely wrong because you got your messaging and your ideas completely wrong, and probably misunderstood what you yourselves were trying to do.

So I just want to finish off with a couple of comments from a New Zealand First perspective. New Zealand First has always been a very, very strong advocate for the retention of assets. We like to see assets owned by New Zealanders, contributing to New Zealand’s economy. The more that we sell, the more that we borrow, of course, the more that the balance of payments is undermined and we keep on paying for that. There is no free lunch when you do these sort of things. We have always supported New Zealand ownership of assets, but in this case, what’s happened, of course, is you’re transferring one asset into another asset, and that is a perfectly valid thing to do because the return is still there for New Zealand—or, in this case, for Auckland. That makes absolute sense to us.

Of course, from our perspective, this also fits very, very closely with our approach, which is, as a party, to say, “We want to see New Zealanders saving more and investing more in our country because that is a way of both making individuals wealthier, of making our country wealthier, of providing better for our retirement income—and we know that that is a massive challenge—and it fits very, very strongly with our initiative to say that we want more money invested in the likes of KiwiSaver.”

So I’m delighted just to finish off and, again, to commend Dr Carlos Cheung and to commend the Auckland Council for this initiative, and to commend the bill to the House.

The next call is a split call.

Tēnā koe e te Pīka. Tēnā tātou e te Whare. I want to start by expressing unmet expectations, and we’ll get the gist of it as I go through.

Unmet expectations: originally, in the first reading, Te Pāti Māori supported the intent of the Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill, a bill that aims to protect whakapapa. It aims to protect intergenerational wealth and secure Auckland’s economic future. However—I say to my colleague on the left, who is smiling—we can no longer continue that support. Our change—

💬 Hon Member: Aw!

—I know; all together—in position reflects a deeper issue. Without stronger and more direct engagement with Māori—that’s the missing piece, and it’s a critical piece from our party’s perspective—this bill cannot deliver on its promise of equity or intergenerational wellbeing. Yes, the bill outlines consultation requirements under the Local Government Act, and, yes, the trustee is expected to uphold Te Tiriti o Waitangi obligations. But let’s be realistic: expectations are not guarantees, and that remains an issue in this regard.

The current mechanisms, including letters of expectation, statements of intent, and council policies, are weak tools for protecting Māori interests. They do not ensure that Māori voices are heard where it matters most, particularly at the decision-making table. There is an undeniable lack of Māori representation, as my dear colleague Takutai Tarsh Kemp referred to when she took the previous speech on this bill.

How can we talk about securing the future for generations to come when Māori, the fastest-growing population in Tāmaki-makau-rau, over 250,000 strong, are not explicitly included in the governance of this fund? If this bill is to honour Te Tiriti o Waitangi, Māori must be engaged as partners, not spectators; as partners in managing the fund, not as spectators watching from the sidelines. And sadly, this bill, even with a good intent—and we did spot that initially, but as it’s progressed, it doesn’t show up well enough in our minds.

This is not a new concern. Māori communities have long fought against the alienation of public- and Māori-owned land—land sold off with minimal consultation, and even less benefit returned to our people. If this fund is to protect intergenerational wealth, then Māori must have a say in what gets sold, how funds are invested, and who benefits from the returns. We acknowledge that the trustee is expected to contribute to the council’s achieving Māori outcomes strategy and work alongside Houkura, formerly the Independent Māori Statutory Board. But Māori must be more than advisers, and we must have the right to decide.

The Disabled Persons Assembly NZ has rightly called for amendments to ensure Māori, including whaikaha Māori, are directly consulted in decisions about the fund. Other submitters have called for mandatory consultation on governance, asset disposal, and capital distribution. These are not unreasonable requests. These are minimum standards if we are serious about upholding Te Tiriti o Waitangi and protecting our community’s interests.

If this bill is truly to serve all of those in Tāmaki-makau-rau, it must embed Māori consultation and representation into its foundations and not leave it to policy interpretation or vague future promises. Māori voices must be central to the development, governance, and oversight of this fund, not peripheral. This is the only way to honour Te Tiriti—that is our only way forward. Thank you, Madam Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. The Green Party, as our previous speaker noted, is voting in support of the Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill which, as others have already described, comes through an unfortunate history of the selling of assets—in this case, airport shares—by Auckland Council. It’s important to note that this decision should shine a light on the importance for central government to adequately support our councils, from a financial point of view, to make sure that councils are able to—rather than having debates about selling assets—if anything, on how more assets can be owned by local communities, and devolved to Māori, as well.

I think the previous speaker made some really valid points and a challenge, in my view, to the Auckland Council and to central government, around the need to strengthen our legislation and frameworks that council uses to make sure that Māori are guaranteed the promise of Te Tiriti, rather than just being a footnote in these pieces of legislation. I think that’s a really fair point, and one that the Green Party agrees with.

We also note that while we didn’t support the decision from Auckland Council, what we have in front of us is the need to establish a framework in how the Auckland Future Fund will go ahead.

I acknowledge the work that the committee did to get to a point of cross-party consensus within the members of the Governance and Administration Committee. I think that is important to at least give people in our largest city a bit of certainty around how that fund will be run in the future, and the frameworks that it will use. But, make no mistake, there’s more work that needs to be done to ensure that councils across the country—and certainly in our largest city—have the resources that they need to do well and to provide the basic essentials that people deserve—whether it’s picking up the rubbish, whether it’s clean drinking water, whether it’s adequate public transport—and a thriving natural environment to protect us against extreme weather events.

May this future fund be used for things that actually benefit our community. I do hope the council takes on board the challenges that have been made by the previous speaker to ensure that the promise of Te Tiriti is fulfilled, not just in future legislation and this one as it should have been but by the way that council operates.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I would like to start by acknowledging Dr Carlos Cheung, a great National Party MP for Mt Roskill. As we’ve heard in this House many times, it’s a great day for Mt Roskill. I want to acknowledge the work he’s done, not just in bringing this bill to the House. He was the first, and eager, to come and appear before the Governance and Administration Committee, and he’s been a staunch advocate not just for Auckland but, in particular, for the people of Mt Roskill over the last couple of years. It’s great to see this coming to the next stage. Well done, Carlos.

He’s not the only one. I’ve been suitably lobbied by a good few number of Auckland MPs on this side of the House that want to see the best outcomes for their community. I’m thinking of the likes of the Hon Melissa Lee, who I’m sure we’ll hear from in a minute, Cameron Brewer from Upper Harbour. We did have the Hon Judith Collins here—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: You can’t speak about people who are not here.

—I just said she’s here—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Not quite.

—advocating for the bill and the people of Papakura. We heard just recently from a member on the other side of the House, saying, “Well, what good will this do for the people of Papakura?” and “What good are decreasing mortgage rates going to do?” I would like to take the opportunity just to respond to that debating point that was raised here before. Let me explain to you how this is good, not just for the people of Papakura but for the people of all of Auckland, and, indeed, around New Zealand. To answer the question from that member, the official cash rate (OCR) has dropped from 5.5 percent to less than half of that, to 2.5 percent. What that means is when you refix the average mortgage, anywhere in New Zealand, you are saving $400 a fortnight. That’s real money in the hands, in the back pockets, of real mums and dads and Kiwis. We heard about a four-minute—

💬 Hon Dr Megan Woods: What’s this got to do with the bill?

—don’t start objecting on the other side. They can’t see the woods for the Woods on that side! But I’ll tell you what, we had about a five-minute tirade from the other side of the House saying that lowering interest rates did nothing for the people of Auckland. I’m explaining to that member—

💬 Hon Rachel Brooking: In a general debate.

—exactly—no, it was not the general debate. It was speech No. 2 of this. If the members had bothered to listen, they would have heard that. It was speech No. 2 of this, and I’m responding to that. This is a great thing, to see what is happening to our economy. They might be a little protective, because their story was taking the OCR from 0.5 percent to 5.5 percent. It’s now back down to 2.5 percent, and that makes a real difference to Aucklanders.

Let’s move away from the distractions of the other side of the House to the Auckland Future Fund. I think one of the questions—

💬 DEPUTY SPEAKER: Which is where the interest rates might come in.

Well, it may do. One of the questions that many people watching will be asking is: why are we even discussing this in Parliament? This is a fund set up by Auckland for Auckland, for ratepayers under the council. How does it end up here? Those that have been watching recent members’ bills—remember, people often talk about private members’ bills. There are private bills, which apply just to a certain individual or entity; there are members’ bills, which are the ones bought by non-executive members of this House; and then there is actually a third category of “local bills”—that’s what this is. It applies just to a council in this case. People will be thinking of the “Takapuna Ice Cream Bill”, which this House has only just recently passed, which enabled the old boat club in Takapuna—on, as we all learnt, Sir Peter Blake Drive—to sell ice creams.

I was in Auckland just recently with the Hon Erica Stanford—another great advocate for Auckland in this House—and, gee, she’s popular up there, isn’t she? As we drove back from there to the Harbour Bridge, I looked across the shimmering waters against the dull, grey, overcast sky, and there was the Takapuna Boat Club—the one that we had passed the legislation for—and I had visions of them selling ice creams; probably not that day. But that’s what this Parliament spent hours and hours and hours working through, and here we are now with a second local bill for Auckland. I think it’s a fair question. Indeed, it’s one that the select committee has considered. Why are we passing this bill?

As Dr Cheung correctly gave us a nice synopsis in his contribution before, the reason—and perhaps one of the only reasons—that it needs to come to this mechanism is because of the supermajority clause: clause 11 in the bill. There are a number of terms set out in clause 8 about how funds should be distributed, and I will just go through those in a minute. Ordinarily, in any other organisation, if you had a majority, you could vote to go outside of that. However, those drafting this legislation saw the need that, in the future, there needs to be adequate protections because this is a considerable amount of ratepayer money that is being put into this fund through the sale of the Auckland Airport shares. How are we going to ensure there is suitable protection to make sure that, in the future, someone won’t just go and change it? That’s why they’re bringing legislation—because, otherwise, under the legislation, you’d just need 51 percent. They’ve put in this clause, clause 11, which requires a supermajority of 75 percent—75 percent.

Let’s just look at what that means. At the moment, when council are distributing funds, they need to meet certain criteria. One of those criteria is that it has got to be managed for the long-term benefit of current and future communities. The second one, and this is clause 8(b), is “with the intent of maintaining or increasing the real value of its capital over time.” In other words, you can’t spend more than you’re earning. If the trust has this much money, it gets a little bit of interest. You can’t spend, effectively, more than the interest that it earns in a given year. The real value of the capital has to increase every single year.

There may be extraordinary circumstances where it’s worth deviating from that rule. Clause 11 is really the crux that makes the requirement for this to be a local bill and to bring it to Parliament, and I would like to go over that. Clause 11(2) is where council may resolve by a supermajority of not less than 75 percent. Three-quarters of the members have to agree—

💬 Hon Phil Twyford: Read it like you mean it.

—based on—well, it’s Auckland; I’m half-hearted, to be honest, about Te Atatū in particular, in this case. The criteria that are set out and that are being enshrined in legislation—this is really the whole reason this has come here today—are that it must be to achieve a benefit that is better for current and future communities: better for them than maintaining or increasing the real capital value. They have to look at what this project is and say, “This is worth it”, and it has to be provided for in the long-term plan. They can’t just come up with a smart idea and say, “Well, actually, this is a good idea, shall we all vote?”—“We think we should have a second ice cream shop in Takapuna. Let’s go and vote for that.” No, this has to be in the long-term plan; it’s been publicly consulted on; it’s going to be publicly notified in accordance with the documents as set out in the Local Government Act; and then get the 75 percent majority. There are suitable protections.

I guess we’re thinking, what are the kinds of examples? We heard earlier from one of the ACT Party contributions, from Mr Court, that perhaps it is new roads to open up a new community, to bring new communities to life, to provide for that. Local roads that will be locally funded or local public transport might require that level of investment. Maybe it’s a stadium or a sporting or community facility in town, so we can have more of those late-night concerts that Helen Clark loves! Maybe it’s something like that. The plan has, firstly, to be consulted on with the community, it has to be adopted into the long-term plan, and then they still need that supermajority of 75 percent.

That’s really what it comes down to. That’s why this, ultimately, becomes worth setting aside the time of this House to come and pass legislation through all stages, through a long select committee process, to give the public opportunity to consult over and above what the council might do. I do want to recognise some of the officials at council who have done a lot of work with the Governance and Administration Committee. I’m particularly thinking of Grace and Katy Bexley, who have done, I think, a superb job of representing their community and working through some of the niggly issues.

Some of those niggly issues might be worth touching on just at the end, around clause 7. One of the submissions we heard in the select committee process was about—clause 7 sets up the governance and management structures—could it not just be an independent statutory body, much like the New Zealand Superannuation Fund? But, actually, what we have learnt as we’ve teased out these ideas is that the protections that are coming through this bill mean you get the Local Government Act 2002 and the Local Government (Auckland Council) Act 2009 legislation that have requirements for auditor-consolidated financial statements, for an auditor’s report, and Auditor-General reviews. That provides, I think, the peace of mind that Aucklanders would be looking for when we look at the sizeable capital that’s being invested into their future. That’s what makes it worth bringing this in the form of a local bill.

There are great things happening for Auckland aside from the investment, like the new City Rail Link, and, of course, the great news that members seem so disappointed about today, with those lowering interest rates saving them $400 a fortnight—great news. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise in support of this bill, but how revealing that we had a National Party MP just stand up and tell us that he was half-hearted about Auckland—a third of New Zealand’s population. He really ought to come and visit and see the beautiful, beautiful thing that is West Auckland in all its glory. We have an amazing city council who some around this room across the aisles have recognised. They’re doing an excellent job in terms of proposing that this bill come to the House.

I do want to recognise all our councils today. Some of us had the opportunity to sit in on the Local Government (System Improvements) Amendment Bill this morning. They do so much. They do so much, and often not just the things they choose to do but what they’re directed to do under statute and under legislation. It’s examples of funds like this that will allow them to secure a good future for Auckland.

I must also mention that Auckland is a city that has seen emergency circumstances before, so I do think that it’s prudent that the system will allow the liquidity of some of these funds in an emergency situation and it’ll do so in a more effective way than the previous system. The previous system would have, if it had been continued, cost an additional $1 million to administer that fund, so it is useful to have that system.

I did read the third-quarter report of the fund, so we’re looking at a new fund here. It hasn’t been all smooth sailing. There were delays in terms of the appointment of the global investment manager, and while the distribution to the council measure was achieved, the gross return and net return for that third quarter weren’t, so no doubt there will be things that we will need to continue to watch, but certainly this fund is placing Auckland in the right direction. I commend it to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It is an absolute pleasure to rise to support this local bill from Auckland Council that is sponsored by my younger brother Dr Carlos Cheung—very tall younger brother—who does amazing work in his electorate of Mt Roskill and in all of Auckland as well, it seems. It is wonderful to see that the council had the confidence in my colleague to make sure that he shepherds this through Parliament. I’m so very pleased that we are here supporting it. He is a very great local MP indeed.

There have been many speeches made on this particular bill, the Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill, in our second reading stage. I’d just like to echo some of my colleagues in the Governance and Administration Committee who talked about the unanimous way that we had worked and the cooperative way that we had actually looked at this bill. I also want to acknowledge Mr Andy Foster, who, despite the fact that he was a former Wellington mayor and a Wellington local government politician, acknowledged the great work of Auckland Council. This did not necessarily have to come to Parliament. The only reason this actually came to Parliament via Dr Carlos Cheung as the sponsoring MP is that Auckland Council wanted to make specific protections to make sure that the fund is protected for the future.

This fund was, essentially, established for the long-term financial security and resilience of Auckland and its communities. It’s all communities; it’s not one community or another community but all of Auckland, because Auckland is the biggest. It is the economic hub, the centre, the heartbeat of New Zealand. It is, in fact, one of the world’s most diverse cities, and more than 30 percent of its population is, in fact, Asian. I’m one of those people who migrated to New Zealand 37 years ago. I think my parents had the intention of moving to Christchurch, but they stopped at Auckland and never left. When they first arrived in New Zealand to actually tour and visit, they thought they would stop in Christchurch, but then they stopped in Auckland because it was, in fact, the place where businesses can actually thrive and the infrastructure was there, and they felt that that was where they wanted my brother and me to settle.

Let me actually get back to the establishment of the fund. The fund was established through the sale of Auckland Council’s shares in Auckland International Airport. They sold the shares for $1.3 billion. When Dr Carlos Cheung was speaking, he was actually talking about how those share prices dropped soon after they had, in fact, sold their shares. Potentially, if they had left the shares or if they were still holding the shares until this year, they could have lost $78 million of whatever they actually sold. The value of their share was $1.3 billion, not million.

That is what is actually financing this Auckland Future Fund. It is, in fact, a protected trust that, hopefully, will generate assets. It, in fact, started from one entity that Auckland Council had shares in. They sold that and set up the Auckland Future Fund so that they could actually own a few others rather than just one entity. That is the investment vision of the Auckland Future Fund and the value of the international assets that they could actually own—not just in Auckland or New Zealand. They can, actually, purchase shares and invest. Their expectation is that they will receive 7.24 percent in terms of returns, and they will invest 2 percent of that return back into the fund to grow the share of the fund and return 5.25 percent to the council where they can actually spend it or invest it on whatever the Auckland Council deems fit to use that fund for.

This is a visionary way in which Auckland Council has actually decided to not be reliant on ratepayer’s money to pay for things. More and more people who are ratepayers are getting very uptight and angry, and I suppose they should. When councils decide to spend the ratepayers’ money—and the rates are constantly going up—ratepayers get very angry about that because they feel that the council’s not doing enough or spending their money well.

Numerous members have actually talked about the potential growth of the Auckland population. We are expected to grow so much. When I first arrived in Auckland in 1988, there wasn’t—

💬 Cameron Brewer: As a small child.

Yeah, I like to pretend that I was a very small child—you couldn’t even find a decent flat white. Now, Auckland prides itself as a place where baristas make amazing coffee, and we are better than Australia, I say. Considering I came from Australia back in 1988, I am very proud to actually say that. We are so good at what we do. We have amazing facilities in Auckland, but we can actually grow with the benefit of the Auckland Future Fund.

While other members were actually talking, I went to the Auckland Future Fund website just to see what they have actually said. It says—and I quote—“As a council-controlled organisation, the Auckland Future Fund operates under the high-level direction of Auckland Council but through an independent structure, where the trustee’s board makes all key decisions. The board oversees the fund under a clear set of investment objectives and policies. Established as a trust, there are strict protections over the fund’s assets. In particular, the protections require the fund to maintain the real value of its capital over the long run.”

When you actually consider the fact that, between December 2024 and June 2025, the fund actually delivered a return of 4.06 percent, which my colleague Dr Carlos Cheung said earlier was a strong result in a volatile global market. When you actually consider the fact that, at the same time, the Auckland International Airport shares actually fell by more than 7 percent, that is good fortune—good luck—in a way. It was also good investment and good foresight to think that Auckland needed to fortify their future and the finances of their council and that they needed to structure the fund so that it has a 75 percent supermajority vote in order for them to decide how they’re going to spend the money and how it needs to be consulted with the people of Auckland. They didn’t just say, “This council decides that we’re going to set up the fund, and the next council will potentially do whatever the heck they like.” It didn’t happen that way. This is protected for the future with a 75 percent supermajority.

I’d like to congratulate the Auckland Council and all of the councillors, and everyone involved in the establishment of the Auckland Future Fund, and the operators and the financial experts and the geniuses that have been employed to look after the Auckland Future Fund. I hope that you can actually do an amazing job to provide a much brighter future for Auckland City ratepayers and also citizens of Auckland City, as I’m one of them. I’d like to, once again, congratulate my colleague Dr Carlos Cheung for bringing this bill to the House. I commend the bill to the House.

The next call is a split call—the Hon Phil Twyford.

I have a question for the Hon Melissa Lee. If she thinks this is such a great policy and such a great bill to put in place protections around safeguarding public assets in an elected organisation like Auckland Council, why didn’t the National Party do that when they flogged off a 50 percent share of the energy gentailers in 2013, 2014, and promptly frittered away the billions of dollars that came into the Government coffers as a result of that privatisation exercise that the National Party did? That’s quite a contrast, and I invite parliamentary colleagues on the National Party benches to think about that for a moment.

There are two good reasons to vote for this bill. The first is that Auckland Council asked this Parliament to legislate these particular safeguards—for example, a 75 percent supermajority before these publicly owned assets can be sold, and also a set of criteria that require a justification for the public good. But the second reason is that this, I think, is a genuine effort to manage public assets in a new way and to get the best out of public ownership. I think it’s right and it’s good to see the great majority of votes in this House supporting this bill.

The $1.3 billion that currently sits in the Auckland Future Fund comes from the sale of the Auckland Airport shares, a 9.71 percent stake. I won’t dwell on that. There were a range of views about whether selling that asset was a good thing or not, but what I do want to comment on is the fact that there are, in our view, some important reasons for public ownership—for example, the holding in public ownership of strategic assets, particularly in situations where you’ve got infrastructure or an entity that’s a natural monopoly. Other reasons: public ownership to deliver a service in a case of market failure or—as is so often the case in New Zealand—where there is a market that suffers from lack of competition and a duopoly or oligopoly, and non-commercial assets that just intrinsically have a strong public-good value.

Since the 1980s, the left and the right in New Zealand politics have been locked in a political argument over asset sales, and the John Key - Bill English flogging off of the energy gentailers’ 50 percent share is, I think, the case study of how badly the right has approached this question of public ownership. As I said before, they frittered away billions and billions of dollars of public value without actually reinvesting that in things that would seriously improve the productivity of New Zealand’s economy. It’s for that reason that the left always resists the selling of public assets and why that has become such a hot-button issue in New Zealand politics.

What I hope is that the wide support in the Parliament for this bill could suggest the possibility of a new consensus about how we approach public ownership. Auckland Council’s Future Fund is based on the idea of strategic management of publicly owned assets. Its charter includes a commitment to growth of those assets, shepherding them and growing them so that Auckland Council is able to use public ownership in a smart way to deliver on its task and to meet the needs of the people of Auckland. It is about using public ownership for the public good.

I urge members—I don’t have any hope for the ACT Party, to be honest, but I urge the National Party at least, and certainly New Zealand First, who, I know, feel strongly about this issue of public ownership, that we must build a consensus around how to properly preserve and look after and grow public ownership in New Zealand in the interest of the public good. There are lots of models around the world that would allow us to do that, and Auckland Council’s initiative with the Future Fund is a modest but positive effort to do this for the people of Auckland.

It’s with great pleasure to rise for the second reading of this Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill. It is a master stroke for our leading region—certainly when it comes to population—and our commercial capital. It is growing at a rate of about 50,000 people per year. In fact, Auckland could reach 2 million people by 2030, so that just gives you some indication of the challenges that lie ahead and the infrastructure need that is unrelenting. This is not about asset sales; this is about asset recycling. This is about selling the old family silver and buying new family silver, and, as others have said, this is ring-fencing this fund in perpetuity, protecting it for future generations. The sell-down of council’s final shareholding in the airport last year, as has been articulated, formed the basis for this $1.3 billion fund that now sits as the Auckland Future Fund.

As has also been mentioned, there have been other contributions—one being in June, by the Port of Auckland, when they announced the special dividend of $45 million to be paid as a capital contribution into the Auckland Future Fund. That came on top of its $52 million dividend for the council. I want to just use this opportunity to acknowledge the success—because it was never guaranteed—of the Port of Auckland and its CEO Roger Gray. I want to also acknowledge the success of the Port of Auckland as it pertains to the chairperson, Jan Dawson, and I congratulate her on being appointed just in the last few days as board chair of ACC. If you want to drive performance in ACC, Jan Dawson is a very good appointment. In fact, I think the mayor said in jest to Jan, and possibly to the CEO of Port of Auckland, that if you don’t get the Port of Auckland going, there’s always the option to sell down the operational arm of the Port of Auckland, but that’s not on the books now given that it’s a contributor to this fund and it’s a contributor to our region and city of Auckland.

As Deputy Mayor Desley Simpson said at the time of the formation of this fund last year, this fund will give our council much needed headroom. I want to thank Desley Simpson for her leadership, not just at the council but around the formation of this Auckland Future Fund. I want to also acknowledge my long-time colleague and friend, former MP and former mayor Christine Fletcher for the work that she’s done on the formation of this Auckland Future Fund, not to mention the landmark legislation that was passed yesterday around the Hauraki Gulf. Christine Fletcher has been key in that. Wayne Brown, of course, has been leading this, and I also, of course, want to acknowledge my good friend and colleague the MP for Mt Roskill, Dr Carlos Cheung. Can I also acknowledge Chris Swasbrook, the chair of the foundation board for the Auckland Future Fund. Chris is going to do a great job there. He’s got a great track record, and he is going to do well.

This Government is working very closely with this council, as you can see. It’s happening before our very eyes, not just with this bill but when you look at the Land Transport Management (Time of Use Charging) Amendment Bill that’s before the Transport and Infrastructure Committee—congestion charging, that is—the reforms of Auckland Transport that will soon kick off and return more democracy and more accountability to Auckland Transport, and a 30-year integrated regional transport plan for Government and council to work on together. Let’s not forget the City Rail Link that’s opening next year, guys, and that being a council and that being a former National Government that kicked that off and that will be there to cut the ribbon. Let’s not forget that it was a former National Government that delivered the amalgamated city, which has given it such clout to create a fund like this for the perpetuity of Auckland. I commend the bill.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for this opportunity for the second day in a row to talk about Auckland. Yesterday, it was about the wonderful Hauraki Gulf and doing some marine protection there—it took too long but it’s great to have it over the line. Today, I’m very happy to be talking, again, about Auckland, which is, of course, our only international city—

💬 Hon Members: Oh!

—and of great importance to all of us here. It’s great, I’m talking up Auckland here! It’s really important.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Teanau Tuiono): What about Palmerston North?

I recognise that as a South Islander. That’s two things to be happy about today: talking about Auckland, one; and, secondly, talking about the future. It’s great to be talking about words like “long term” and “future” in this. The purpose here is to safeguard these funds, so it’s to continue as a long-term financial investment for the benefit of the current and future communities of the Auckland region. It’s so good to have these safeguards in place so that this money will be used for the long-term benefit. I wish we could see more of this in the House. I commend the bill.

It’s a great day to talk about Auckland. I’ve long been a big fan of Auckland.

💬 Hon Dr Deborah Russell: Talk for 10 minutes, James.

What was that sorry, Dr Russell? Dr Russell would like to say that she wants me to speak for 10 minutes. Well, I could only possibly speak for 10 minutes if I had a plethora of notes in front of me, because that’s what some members obviously need to spend 10 minutes talking in the House—but not me. I don’t need speaking notes. I don’t need a copious amount of assistance for my colleagues. I don’t even need a copy of the bill to speak to this, because today we’re here to talk about a fantastic bill, promoted by my excellent colleague Dr Carlos Cheung. Hasn’t he done a great job in bringing this bill to this House, this Auckland Council (Auckland Future Fund) Bill? Isn’t it an excellent bill that Dr Cheung has brought to this House?

I don’t know if there’s much more to say in this short contribution that my colleague Cameron Brewer hasn’t already well and truly covered off. He gave an enormous amount of praise to the likes of Ms Fletcher and Mayor Wayne Brown. He even said that Mayor Brown had been talking about how if Port of Auckland doesn’t improve their performance, maybe he’ll sell down their operational arm. Well, hasn’t he been shown about what a success story Port of Auckland can be, with the tremendous results, and of course, with the development that they are undertaking? Just last week, I believe, they turned the sod on the berth extension down there at Bledisloe North. Of course, that was only made possible by the likes of the fast-track legislation, another amazing bit of legislation that this Government has passed through the House for the economic growth of New Zealand and of Aucklanders—similarly, this key bill as well, which will also add to that economic growth.

Now, of course we’re not talking about short-term gains here; we’re talking about a long-term financial investment fund to support the long-term growth of Aucklanders. That is the kind of Government we are; we are a Government that is focused not on the here and now but on the next 10, 20, 30 years. What does Auckland look like for future generations, for our children and our grandchildren? Possibly not my children and grandchildren, because, of course, they’ll be required to spend the majority of their life in the South Island, unless they give up their passport!

I need to raise an issue with the contribution of the previous speaker, the Hon Rachel Brooking, who said Auckland is our only international city. Now, I’m not going to denigrate the speaker—I’m sure she misspoke and was just trying to give the right amount of praise to Auckland—but, of course, we have a number of brilliant cities in this country: Christchurch, Dunedin, Timaru. These are all fantastic cities that could do with similar investment to what we’re getting through this particular fund. But I digress. I talk too much about the South Island on a day which is really specifically supposed to be about the Auckland Future Fund (AFF) local bill.

Now, of course this bill is one which aims to protect the real value of Auckland Council’s assets for generations to come. I think it’s worth looking at that for a second, because you’ve seen a lot of this in this Government: thinking about, well, how do we actually make sure that we secure the future for New Zealanders for the next 10, 20, 30 years? Along with this particular piece of legislation, I also reflect on the work of the National Infrastructure Plan, which is one of those pieces of work which has received bipartisan support across the House. When you look at what Minister Bishop is trying to do in that infrastructure space and the needs of cities like Auckland, who need to grow not only now but in the future, you’ll see that the investment opportunity that funds like this produce are key to that investment.

We’ve got to provide certainty to the international community if they’re looking to invest heavily in New Zealand, if we’re going to invest in our ports, in our roads, in our infrastructure, in our tunnels, in our bus lanes—let’s say some day, in the far distant future, light rail may even be a possibility in some of our big cities. It might not come now, but funds like this at least give us the opportunity to explore those options, and it means we don’t have to go cap in hand across the world looking for every dollar and cent; we can actually get it from within.

Now, I will talk a little bit about the management of the fund. My understanding from my colleague, and I spoke to him about this a short while ago, just before taking this call, was that it is important to highlight that the management of the fund will be flexible. Of course, it allows for internal or external governance structures, including trusts or other entities. That’s important, because we don’t want to put this investment fund inside a square box with very hard, thick, bold outlines that they can’t be manoeuvred in and out of. We want to provide some flexibility, because we don’t know what the future’s going to bring in the next 30 years for Auckland. We don’t know whether, in 30 years’ time, it should be in a trust or the fund should be in another kind of entity, or whether or not there’s some sort of third entity that exists in 30 years’ time. Providing that flexibility for management is very important for this kind of bill.

It is also important to note, for those who may have some concerns about the management of the funds in this, we are going to make sure—and we have made sure in this legislation—that only appropriately qualified and independent individuals will be responsible for making investment decisions related to the AFF assets. It should come as a lot of reassurance to members opposite that only those with the highest and most prestigious of qualifications will be entitled to participate in this process. I’m not going to point out any single particular university, but I know you could name the likes of the University of Otago, for example. If you’ve got master’s degrees or PhDs from that university, that would be, I think, the kind of qualification that would qualify you to be a manager in this fund. Not any qualification; you wouldn’t necessarily want your law graduates, like myself, running around doing that kind of stuff, but maybe your accounting or your finance graduates—or maybe someone with a PhD in tax or revenue or something like that; some of those really intelligent individuals that we have here in the House who, in fact, make a decent living out of teaching future generations about this kind of ability, these kinds of jobs that you can gain when you have a high-quality qualification in New Zealand.

Now, I’ve talked a little bit about the management of the fund. I’ve talked about how only appropriately qualified and independent individuals will be able to be making investment decisions. We also need to talk about how the decisions about distributing the fund will be made very carefully. I’m not too sure whether there is scope for further amendments, but whether or not we put some sort of qualification requirement on how those individuals make those decisions. I mean, I’m not sure we necessarily want them all to have to have PhDs; you want, maybe, some business experience or some investment, real-world experience from those who haven’t necessarily spent the five or six years grinding away at the University of Otago, going into the Burns Lecture Theatre or down to the Quad to get their Master’s and then their PhD under the supervision of one of the excellent professors—sorry, very excellent professors, my colleague Vanessa Weenink says, from experience, I think.

I think that you could actually extend maybe those kinds of criteria to those who are making decisions about distributing the funds because we’ve got to ensure that they align with the intended benefit of enhancing the region’s wellbeing. I’m talking about all of the regions, and my colleague before mentioned the amalgamation that is, I think, close to 15 years old now. I know there were some road bumps along the way, some maybe $500,000 speed bumps along the way, to amalgamation, but I think, on the whole, it has been good for Auckland. I think one of the good things about the region and securing its future is that there is a consistent approach across all of Auckland. Having not spent a lot of time in Auckland myself, much to my great shame, I think—I’d love to spend more time in Auckland but there are mountains to climb and tahr to hunt down in the “Riviera of the South”. I understand that bringing that disparate grouping of Auckland councils together to create this single entity has really—you know, I think Ms Brooking maybe had a point; it has really turned Auckland into a great international city, a city that we can be proud of, and we can be proud of the people that have been born and raised and come from Auckland, and those who choose to move there and live there.

I actually think that bills like this that are aimed at securing the future of regions like Auckland are incredibly vital to its success, so kudos to Mr Brewer, Mr Cheung, Ms Nakhle, and all the other Aucklanders who are in here. I see Mr Wilson down there as well. There’ll be a fierce battle in Upper Harbour this year, I would imagine. Who can be the “king of the bridge” up there? Hopefully they do better than their rugby team, but we’ll talk about that later on!

Look, I know I can’t get another call, and as much as I would love to take another 10 minutes exhorting the values of Auckland, I just think we should really sign off this brief contribution by recognising that it is important that as a country—I know I’m the Minister for the South Island and it’s not a North versus South thing—we do need to come together as a country. We do need to make sure that all parts of our great nation are contributing to the economic success of New Zealand; whether that is the far Far North, in Grant McCallum’s electorate—which he says as miles above the rest, but I think he’s looking at the map upside down—or whether we’re right down in the deep South, where I was last week, in Invercargill, looking at some of the fantastic on-land aquaculture opportunities that are there.

It’s the kind of approach that we need to take to make sure that “New Zealand Inc.” as a whole operates to make sure that we have the kind of country and future that generations want to live, work, play, and raise a family. So, with that, bearing in mind that I will be in Auckland this Saturday and I will be enjoying the economic growth and vibrancy that we are seeing there over the coming years—I haven’t yet been able to get a ticket to the train, but I’m hoping that all going well with my associate transport role, maybe I can get a brief delegation to join the rail link. But, in saying that, I really do think this is an excellent bill. I’m glad it’s supported across the House, and I commend it to the country.

Well, that was a real lesson in opportunity!

I declare the House in committee for further consideration of the Companies (Address Information) Amendment Bill.