National leader Christopher Luxon attended on the nearby K\u0101piti Coast last month<\/a>, this query came from a critic of the policy who argued they had not worked internationally.<\/p>\nHipkins said Labour had supported the Government\u2019s rates cap legislation at first reading so it could get to select committee, but had not committed to going further. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve supported the rates cap at first reading… I encourage everyone to make a submission on it,\u201d Hipkins said. <\/p>\n
\u201cI have no problem saying we don\u2019t want rates to increase at the rate they\u2019ve been going up,\u201d he said, but added the cap could mean councils imposing user charges for \u201cthe services you rely on\u201d, which could leave people no better off. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe haven\u2019t committed to supporting it beyond first reading and we will let that process run its course.\u201d <\/p>\n
There appeared to be mixed views on councils. <\/p>\n
A later questioner raised concerns about the Government\u2019s move to force council amalgamations. Hipkins\u2019 answer was interrupted by another person, who said, \u201cwe have incompetence at local councils\u201d.<\/p>\n
Another attendee complained about the Wellington region\u2019s first water bills from Tiaki Wai, the new water entity. <\/p>\n
He asked Hipkins what he would do to \u201cstop the council from gouging us with our Tiaki Wai bills\u201d.<\/p>\n
Hipkins said Tiaki Wai was established under the National Government\u2019s Local Water Done Well policy. He said the organisation needed to be held accountable, but councils \u201cdo need to spend money upgrading our water infrastructure\u201d.<\/p>\n
The strongest applause came after questions on pay equity, helping beneficiaries, and someone complaining that MPs spent too much time \u201cbitching\u201d in Parliament.<\/p>\n
![\"The]()
The meeting had plenty of empty seats at 6.20pm (left) but had filled up 10 minutes later once the meeting got underway. Photos \/ Thomas Coughlan<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone is bitching and that\u2019s no good\u2026 You don\u2019t need to downgrade yourself bitching with all the other parties!\u201d the person said. <\/p>\n
There was some grumpiness from the crowd, although no major disruption during the evening. When Hipkins was answering a question about the Government\u2019s use of urgency, someone at the back of the hall noted the Labour leader had rushed through legislation when he was in Government. <\/p>\n
Another person came up to Hipkins after the meeting and asked whether he would apologise for the \u201chundreds\u201d of people who died as a result of Covid policies. He was asked to leave by security and did so.<\/p>\n
Other criticisms were more friendly. One critic said Labour didn\u2019t crow sufficiently about its achievements in Government.<\/p>\n
\u201cBetter starts now, well, better was happening then,\u201d Amalgamated Workers Union regional secretary Robert Popata said.<\/p>\n
However, he went on to raise concerns about Working for Families entitlements being clawed back as wages grow, which left people no better off.<\/p>\n
Hipkins said Labour will have \u201cannouncements in due course\u201d, and noted the party had promised to lift Working for Families abatement thresholds at the last election.<\/p>\n
Popata later told the Herald that Working for Families thresholds were a problem for members who noticed pay rises weren\u2019t resulting in real increases in take-home pay.<\/p>\n
The meeting had threatened to get off to a rough start.<\/p>\n
At 6.20pm, with 10 minutes before the meeting was scheduled to begin, a substantial number of seats were still vacant. However, the roughly 110 seats filled rapidly and about 10 more had to be added at the back. <\/p>\n
Media reports of Luxon\u2019s public meeting in the Hutt Valley estimated about 250 people had attended (National\u2019s own estimate put the number at 300). <\/p>\n
![\"Police]()
Police security were on hand at Labour leader Chris Hipkins’ public meeting. Photo \/ Thomas Coughlan<\/p>\n
It was Hipkins\u2019 first public meeting of the campaign proper, with the Labour leader slow off the blocks before the November election. <\/p>\n
Luxon\u2019s \u201cBuild the Future\u201d tour wrapped up on Tuesday night with a public meeting in his own electorate of Botany. New Zealand First\u2019s Winston Peters and Shane Jones have been touring the country for months. Act\u2019s Paul Henry has also been touring extensively. <\/p>\n
![\"Former]()
Former Labour MP Trevor Mallard was among those attending Labour’s campaign event. Photo \/ Thomas Coughlan<\/p>\n
One consideration for Labour\u2019s late start has been the point in the campaign when the Opposition leader can avail themselves of the Dignitary Protection Service (DPS), the police branch that provides security for the Prime Minister and is extended to their parliamentary counterpart during election campaigns. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Labour Hutt South candidate Ginny Andersen meets a constituent and his cat. Photo \/ Thomas Coughlan The first…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":595023,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1443,95,12116,293228,11783,1738,8688,3276,15441,262094,42678,2550,19555,1888,13480,22772,108,6721,13489,2374,79817,3025,293226,111,43,139,69,1118,9346,384,3109,192123,20420,208,1680,293227],"class_list":["post-595022","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-about","tag-and","tag-arms","tag-belladonna","tag-brought","tag-campaign","tag-cat","tag-chris","tag-crowd","tag-electionyear","tag-electorate","tag-even","tag-evening","tag-first","tag-hipkins","tag-holds","tag-kicked","tag-labour","tag-leader","tag-meeting","tag-meetings","tag-most","tag-naenae","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-packed","tag-people","tag-public","tag-remutaka","tag-supporters","tag-tour","tag-wednesday","tag-wellbehaved"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=595022"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595022\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/595023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=595022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=595022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=595022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}