The annual event will be at the Oamaru Opera House on June 28.
Ready to spar on the "pro team" for the South Island are local media and entertainment personalities singer Alice Hore, radio host Dan Lewis and Jim Hopkins.
IHC New Zealand patron Dame Denise L’Estrange-Corbet, broadcaster Duncan Garner and retired broadcaster Peter Williams, a former Waitaki Boys’ old boy, will make up the North Island "negative" team.
IHC North Otago association committee member Noel Joyce said the night will be full of humour, clever oratory and good-natured banter.
"It will be a fun-filled night of hilarity," he said.
The celebrity debate was the main annual fundraiser for the association for a number of years.
Local performer Hore, who was a judge at last year’s event, will this year join the panel.
She said "in the South Island we’re all about quality over quantity on the brains trust".
"I’m more of a swede stomper than a tussock rummager," she joked.
Debate stalwart Hopkins said "this is the island of exclusivity and we embody that".
He said the team had a "combined IQ north of 1000", as Lewis nodded his head in agreement.
The debate will be chaired by Waitaki MP Miles Anderson and adjudicated by Moeraki Constituency representative, Otago Regional Councillor Kevin Malcolm.
Mr Joyce said the event had filled the Opera House for 20 years and they hoped to do so again this year.
"It’s a whole new crowd, and a broader demographic — it’s an intelligent audience, from farmers to business people, it’s a fun night out for groups, too," he said.
All funds raised will go towards "enhancing the lives of the people in Waitaki with intellectual disabilities", he said.
