Just maybe, the Government is preparing for a climb down on the Auckland super city’s second tier. It has been probably the most vexed aspect of the Government’s super city model. And much as I would like to see Messers Key, Hide and Carter die in the ditch over such an unpopular and misconceived policy, it is good for Auckland if they are about to throw this particular doozie overboard.
To recap: the Government rejected the Royal Commission’s recommendation of six local councils with the power to deal with local issues. Instead they proposed 20-30 local boards with very limited local powers, and the job of community engagement. These have been widely derided as toothless talkshops (by me and many many others). In fact I struggle to recall anyone who has publicly defended the Government’s second tier other than Rodney Hide. Almost everybody else has weighed in against them, most notably two of the Commissioners Justice Peter Salmon and David Shand, but also Lawrence Yule of Local Government NZ, the three horsemen (Mayors Len Brown, Bob Harvey, Andrew Williams), both the Fairfax and APN community newspaper chains, and an array of campaigners and community groups, plus Labour and the Greens.
Local Govenment Minister Rodney Hide wasn’t quite running up the white flag when I pressed him on this last week at question time, but Judith Collins saying the local boards had better be more than ‘tea and scone clubs’ was a hint that support for his second tier was leaking away. Hell, John Key was backing away the week before.
The climb down is now well underway with John Carter (the kinder, gentler face of reform) telling Radio NZ he’d ‘learned a huge amount’ through Auckland community meetings and discussions on the issue and ‘it’s helped focus my mind on the things that matter for people. And where I started some six or eight weeks ago, I’ve shifted personally, myself, a lot.’ And then telling the Eastern Courier how important it is to get the lower tier right, how people were telling him they wanted fewer boards than the 20-30 being proposed, and how they needed to be given their own budgets.
That is heartening. I have no doubt the select committee is going to hear plenty of submissions on this issue so the Government will have no shortage of advice on how to get this aspect of the super city right. For the record, Labour wants to see empowered and resourced local councils with the ability to deal with the important local issues – to keep the local in local government:
1. fewer local councils than the 20-30 proposed in the bill
2. governance and policy making responsibility over local services and assets
3. control over their own budgets
4. powers and responsibilities mandated in law (not delegated at the discretion of the Auckland Council)
It remains a mystery why the Government got it so horribly wrong in the first place, thinking they could ram through these changes without the public really noticing, under the cloak of blaming the region’s Mayors who, ironically, have been doing a pretty good job of keeping local government local. As the Commission argued, if you are going to centralise the big regional functions in the super city, then you must balance that with an empowered second tier of local governance that has the mandate and the capability to do the local stuff well.
Phil,
You do have a big dilemma on this one. If you say nothing and wait for the Titanic to hit he rocks, I am sure you will benefit politically (as we saw in Mt Albert). This is of course not the right thing to do.
I am certain that what the government’s reponse to the Royal Commission shows, is that they don’t understand what local government actually does. They don’t seem to appreciate the complexity of functions it performs and the number of groups/organisations that are dependent upon it. This is surprising for supoosedly experienced politicians who presumably would have had considerable dealings with the other tier of government in NZ. Interesting that John Carter talks about the ‘learning curve’ as if the Royal Commission was never even read.
TopCat – It is hard to imagine what they were thinking with their 20-30 boards. One of the arguments that has been made against it is that unless there is a second tier empowered to deal with all the local stuff, then those things will either a. distract the 20-odd councillors on the Auckland Council from the big regional issues, or b. just get delegated to council staff and thus bypass the political process.
Let us assume that there is movement on the second tier, in the face of widespread opposition to the current proposal. Mr Hide can only make political capital out of this (assuming that it is a serious movement), presenting as a listening minister who has shifted ground. Yes, his opponents will say that he’s had his arm twisted, but the public will,I imagine, accept that consultation has been allowed to work reasonably properly.
The devil is in the detail of the second tier. It has to be sufficiently empowered to allow local voices rights and determinations, whilst not unnecessarily compromising decisions that properly are region wide. So, for me, there are two key dimensions that are important – the level and quality of the devolution of powers to the second tier, and the quality and seriousnes of the feedback process up to the Council from the second tier.
The one thing I’m not potentially sold on in Labour’s proposal is the need for fewer local boards. I guess that having the local boards reasonably large would lead to economies of scale and actually give them a bit more power, but that comes at the cost of ensuring we do have a very local aspect to local government.
I think the ARC’s original submission to the Royal Commission had a great model for how things should be done – effectively one over-arching council and 20-30 smaller community councils (with less powers than current City/District councils, but more than the proposal local boards).
There are some tricky issues to deal with still:
1) Should the ward boundaries match the local board boundaries? (I think yes).
2) Should these match with electorate boundaries? (There are arguments both ways on this).
3) How do deal with the gulf islands? (clearly a community of interest, but with a fairly low population)
4) How can the local boards be given “more real power” in the legislation?
I wonder how many submissions were made….. mine’s here: http://transportblog.co.nz/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/Auckland-Council-Bill-submission-final.pdf
Phil,
Your second point- relating to how much power we are prepared to hand over to unelected council officials (through delegation) is in my mind the key issue for the select committee to get their teeth into. If you remove all power from locally elected representatives, it has to go somewhere. I am surprised that ACT, with their Liberatarian philosophy (which admittedly I only have a limited knowledge of), does not have a problem with this
Jarbury – I tend to think that if we had 10-15 local councils that would make them local enough. Its a balance isnt it – small enough to be local and big enough to be capable. OTOH as you say there good arguments for aligning the local council boundaries with the Auckland Council ward boundaries, and in turn with electorates…which would make 20 the logical number. I certainly think Waiheke has a strong case for its own ward and local council on the grounds that it is such a distinct community of interest. Looking forward to reading your submission. Hey you might have noticed that the Select Committee decided late in the piece to hear submissions on the voting system contrary to my earlier comments.
Thanks Phil – yeah 20 could be a good number, aligning with electorates. Although then you get the issue of what to do when electorate boundaries change.
I included a paragraph advocating for STV to be used as the voting system in my submission.
I really think you’re being incredibly specious here Phil.
Initially the ministers made some, admittedly, glib press statements about what they thought the boards/councils would do. Of course the bills hadn’t even been drafted and there were then many meetings and other consultative measures put in place. The Bill is vague on what the roles, functions and powers of the boards are and that is something I have submitted that should change. I can’t see how fewer boards can be better for local democracy, maybe you can explain that. And I agree that they should be bulk funded and able to set their own budgets. Indeed your items 2-4 I agree with, and quoting Andrew Williams as some authority on local government is like using John Daly as an authority on golf etiquette.
In my view there is no “climb down”. It is democracy in action. Your problem is that it isn’t the Labour party effecting it.
Nick, the legislation was drafted before there were any community meetings – hence the likely changes. The Bill isn’t really that vague on the roles, functions and powers of the local boards either – it specifically says that they’re not councils or community boards (only unincorporated societies). It’s also very specific on what they can do, basically only what the Auckland Council delegates to them.
Climb down v democracy in action – aren’t they two sides of the same coin? Though I do agree that changes to stupid legislation as a result of consultation should be encouraged and not derided.
Nick, it is not correct for you to say “the Bill is vague on what the roles, functions and powers of the boards are”. The Bill is very specific in stating that a local board cannot hire staff, cannot own anything, cannot make rates, cannot make by-laws, cannot borrow money, cannot make annual plans or reports. It is just buried in a reference to a schedule in the Local Government Act, which most people won’t bother to actually look up. And lay off the personal attacks on the current Mayors. It turns out they have been right all along.
Jennifer, the Bill is vague on exactly what the functions, roles and powers are. They should be listed, either in the Bill or another idea I had was to use regulations to promulgate them. I know the schedule you are referring to and it is a convoluted process to go through to figure out exactly what the functions, roles and powers are via this method. Your quote above is what the boards cannot do, not what they can do. Wanaka Council has an explicit mechanism whereby the community boards there can do everything the Council can do, except the prohibitions in the LGA 2002, unless the council says otherwise. That is better than saying that a local board has a duty to “reach agreement with the Council in respect of service levels, local facilities, and funding arrangements within its local board area”, as contained in clause 13(2)(c) of the Bill. Perhaps you’d like to explain how this is crystal clear as to the boards duties? What if a Board cannot agree? Has it breached its legal duty and if so can the council sue it? Why hasn’t the council got the same duty – to reach agreemnt with the boards? And to labour this point, how can any entity or person have a legal duty to reach an agreement with someone else? It’s farcical.
If it is left to the boards to receive delegated powers under subclause (2) of clause 13 this will be most unsatisfactory. Politicians do not like giving away power and this is the cause of Auckland City Council’s present disputes with its community boards as the Council has removed delegations and won’t give them back. This does make the boards useless, a situation I do not want to occur with this legislation.
All of this is why the functions, duties and powers need to be clarified. They are vague and need to be listed in the legislation.
Nick,
If you take away the powers that are forbidden in The Bill and specified under LGA 2002, remembering that they cannot employ, you would have to agree that they will be totally dependent upon the powers delegated by Auckland Council. Even then the fact that they cannot hire and fire staff means that they will be totally beholden to Auckland Council for resources.
The problem with delegation is that Auckland Council will be able to play favourites, if you get a ‘difficult’ Board who questions your decisions, the Auckland Council can merely withdraw all delegation.
Hence you point about specifying powers in The Bill is a good one, they will need to defend their interests.
jarbury says:
June 29, 2009 at 11:49 am
Nick, the legislation was drafted before there were any community meetings
jarbury, there’s a reason why it’s called ‘DRAFTING’.
Phil Twyford just accepted that 20 councils might be a good balance, and considering Hide is recommending 20-30, I don’t see what the problem is.
Nick, my preference would be for the powers to be set out in the legislation, rather than left to Ministerial whim in regulation. My point was that the government is not in the least bit reluctant to legislate for what the boards cannot do.
I just got called to book in a time to speak to my submission on the Super City. Next Wednesday evening.
However, one thing stood out. We only 5 minute time-slots….. FIVE MINUTES!!???? I got twice that long via teleconferencing on the RMA Amendment Bill.
Is that including or excluding time for questions does anyone know?
jarbury, 5 minutes? That’s a joke. Even if the purpose is to speak to support the written submission, 5 minutes is an insult. I hope someone makes an issue of this. Carter, Key and Hide have drawn cover for their lack of consultation by talking up the submission process. And now this? I wonder if everyone is getting 5 minutes? I wonder if the government’s mates and cheerleaders will only get 5 minutes too?
I don’t even know if that includes the time for them to ask me questions – I assume that it goes!
It will be a case of “Hi, my name is…… the super city is an OK idea but you need to make a few changes, any questions?”
Pretty disappointing really.
(I assume that it does, not goes)*
jarbury – Normally select committees give oral submitters up to 15 min. I am told 10 min is not uncommon with bills like this that generate a large volume of submissions. However 5 minutes to me seems a bit draconian and I argued in the committee that it is not enough. The committee agreed it would exercise some flexibility. The time allocation does include time for questions btw.
Phil, do you know how many submissions there are?
10 minutes seems reasonable, 5 minutes rather pointless actually.
jarbury – Around 1400 submissions. About half will present in person. Committee is meeting in different venues around Auckland, including Waiheke and the Barrier, and several marae.
Thanks for that info Phil. See you next Wednesday then for (hopefully) a bit longer than five minutes. How come Simon Bridges is on the select committee – MP for Tauranga?????
Who knows, maybe Tauranga will be next to get supered?
Phil – most of the talk seems to have been about what powers are given to the local tier of government. A couple of issues seem to have been glossed over though, yet I think are still very important.
Firstly, little if anything has been said about who will pick up the slack of getting rid of the ARC. It seems like we’re all just assuming that the Auckland Council will do that. However, the ARC plays an important role as an “environmental advocate” at the moment in the planning process. They often make submissions on council plan changes and resource consents, applying their regional outlook and expertise to come up with better solutions. If the Auckland Council is making the plans, plan changes and processing the resource consents – then they can’t really take on this role. So who will?
Secondly, little seems to have been said about the ‘at large’ councillors lately. This is a pretty major issue in my opinion, yet it’s hard to see whether the government is likely to budge on it. I have heard Auckland City Council (at least the C&R majority) is quite keen on the at large councillors – presumably because they reckon they’ll end up with a permanent majority because of them.
Just wondering if you’d heard much about these issues in recent times. The ARC issue in particular seems to have not been raised much at all.
jarbury, I think it was John Carter in the newspaper the other day saying, in effect, that people want all 20 elected by ward and none elected ‘at large’. Don’t really know what to read into that, but maybe it signals movement on the issue? Interesting point regarding the ARC, but isn’t Rodney’s mantra about ‘red tape’ the answer? Surely he sees the ARC making submissions to Councils as wasteful bureaucracy to be eliminated? Who needs costly checks and balances once the right people are in charge?
Jennifer, thanks for that. Sounds promising that the at large councillors may be history then. Regarding the ARC’s role, I guess the devil will be in the detail of how the new council is structured.
Perhaps this concern might be more relevant to the (yet to come) third piece of legislation.
Phil,
I think you missed a trick in the House today. Trying to highlight the back-down by contrasting the recent comments of John Carter with the government’s initial proposal – to my mind – only served to provide Hide with the opportunity to proclaim that their ‘consultation’ has worked and that they have listened to Aucklanders. We all know what a joke that is, but ‘them’s the breaks’. There is little mileage in driving a wedge between Hide and Carter – who has done a good job of soaking up the pressure for National – but there is in highlighting Hide’s previous comments on Auckland reform. Surely your research unit has Hide’s speeches from before the Royal Commission when Hide himself promoted a single council with all councillors elected by ward!
Would it not have been more politik to push further in the area you touched on with your last supplementary? Hide’s total inability to explain the contradiction in his position over wishing to protect ratepayers from projects such as the Otago Stadium, whilst ignoring the fact that the government has foisted the Queens Wharf ‘party venue’ upon Aucklanders without consultation is simply unbelievable.
Furthermore, how can Hide and his ACT party campaign for years and years on ensuring local government focuses on ‘core services’ when Hide himself confesses to not know what ‘core services’ are? He says as much in his speech to Federated Farmers – clearly intimating that “I don’t know what core services are, but Councils should focus on delivering these undefined services, and must get permission from ratepayers to deliver services outside those that I have not defined”.
Yet more? Well back in August last year Hide voted for legislation to require Auckland ratepayers to fund the Auckland Theatre Company, etc, yet in the Fed Farmers speech he castigated the local council for funding the Nelson Performing Arts Centre. What gives?
Phil – When will Labour actually realise that all their lip service about rebuilding and listening has about as much credibility as Hide’s answer to your last supplementary?
There are holes in this big enough to drive Gerry Brownlee through, yet somehow you guys keep missing the considerably large target.