Hon NANAIA MAHUTA (Minister of Local Government): Can I thank the deputy chair of the Governance and Administration Committee for opening the debate and acknowledge the select committee for its consideration of what is a very dynamic and changing space in the area of local government. It is important to note that because local government affects the day-to-day wellbeing of our communities, the depth and range of issues that are confronted in local decision-making are significant, rapidly changing, and evolving to address not only the mainstay of what local government is about, which is democratic representation of community wellbeing across your social, economic, environmental, and cultural domains, but increasingly, when we look at the natural disasters that are being addressed in the moment, local government also has to make a contribution in areas such as civil defence, natural disaster management, and, indeed, recovery, in a way that they haven't experienced ever before. The point was made that, yes, we spent a lot of time discussing the three waters programme because it is a significant reform impacting on the sector, but we also discussed other aspects that local government want to see further evolved and that is in the area of future for local government. So I look forward to discussing both those areas in depth. 