Lump Sum bill likely for Governor’s Bay

Press, 3 December 1987, Page 42

Lump Sum bill likely for Governor’s Bay

Political reporter

A bill to allow Governor’s Bay residents to opt for a lump sum payment of their proposed sewerage and water scheme is likely to become law before Christmas. The Mount Herbert County Council (Lump Sum Contributions) Empowering Bill was reported back from the Internal Affairs and Local Government Select Committee on Tuesday.

The chairman of the select committee, Mr Jack Elder, said the sole contentious point in the bill was a clause allowing

property-owners the late election of a lump sum payment. This clause had been deleted, but would not be an immediate issue. When it did become relevant, the Rating Powers Bill—- — more general rating bill — would have been passed. Provision of the late election of lump sum payments was included in this bill. Mr Elder indicated that the Mt Herbert Bill would largely be redundant after the passing of the Rating Powers Bill next year. It was necessary, howto allow the council

to begin work on its water and sewerage scheme. The member of Parliament for Lyttelton, Dr Peter Simpson, said that the Health Department had left the council no option but to proceed with the sewerage and water scheme.

. As the Government subsidy for the scheme was fixed, the longer the scheme took to proceed, the more the value of this subsidy would be affected by inflation.

He said that the key reason for the scheme was to eliminate a potential health risk. >