Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) - New Zealand Parliament

3638 Local Government (Auckland Reorganisation) Bill 16 May 2009
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Rick Barker): I say to the member, with all due
respect, that the whole structure of his argument is based on a wrong assumption. The
fact is that whatever name the member puts on these amendments—whether he calls
them “parts”, “model parts”, or whatever—they are all amendments. Each one is an
amendment. An amendment that has “part” on it has exactly the same status in this
Committee as an amendment that takes out one word and substitutes another. It is an
amendment—it is nothing other than an amendment to the bill. It is no different. It is
irrelevant whether the member calls the amendment a part; it is still an amendment.
However, the Chair, instead of having a very narrow debate on an amendment, has
given consideration to the fact that the amendment has a substantial amount of clauses
in it, which is why we had multiple speeches on the amendment and did it slightly
differently from any other amendment. That is the point we are at.
I reiterate two things. Firstly, the Chair will be the sole determiner of the debate and
will then simply allow the Committee to make its own decision about whether the
debate continues. Secondly, the Chair’s decision will be driven by two things: whether
there has been relevance, and whether there has been undue repetition. So there are two
criteria: relevance and repetition. If members are relevant and are providing fresh
material, then the Committee will continue to debate the part. The moment it changes—
there is repetition, and relevance goes down—then the Chair will start to look at a
closure motion.
Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour): Speaking to the amendment to insert new Part
10, in the name of Carol Beaumont, I draw attention to a couple of points in particular.
First of all, the members opposite are of the view that these amendments are vexatious,
and they are expressing some irritation that the Opposition should be bringing such
amendments to the Committee. Nothing could be further from the truth. The point is
that we have been opposing this bill because it is an affront to democracy and because it
is an affront to the rights of the people of Auckland.
This amendment, in particular, although not addressing the democratic rights in
substance, actually goes to the question of something that is even as profound as
Aucklanders’ democratic rights. It goes to the question of the working conditions and
the security of the people who work within local government services in Auckland. That
is the issue. That is why, I say to Mr Power, who is now the Minister in the chair, this
could in no way be considered a vexatious amendment. It is nothing of the sort.
In fact, I draw to the attention of the Committee the Government’s voting on matters
such as this even as recently as last night. The Government voted down amendments
that asked for the views of women, of Māori, of Pasifika, and of people of different
ethnicities to be represented in the consideration of the Auckland Transition Agency.
This amendment gives the Government a chance to reconsider the mistakes it made
last night. The effect of what the Government did last night was to forbid women,
Māori, Pasifika, and other interest groups to have any kind of consultation on, or
representation in, the activities of the Auckland Transition Agency. Time and time again
the Opposition put up amendments that asked for the Minister of Women’s Affairs to be
consulted and for the Minister of Pacific Island Affairs to be consulted. The
amendments did not even go as far as to call for a poll, although there was a moment
when we did call for one. In fact, the amendments asked just that the Ministers
responsible for the portfolios of women, Pasifika, people with disabilities, and ethnic
affairs be consulted in the process.
The Government voted against every one of those amendments. That needs to be
sheeted home to the Government, because we will be talking about that around
Auckland for years to come. This amendment gives the Government another