4 May 2009

Local voice ignored by Cabinet says North Shore Mayor

North Shore City Mayor Andrew Williams says that he is deeply disappointed the government has announced today it is ploughing on with its plans for an Auckland ‘Super City’ despite pledges to listen to local concerns.

Next week the government will ram legislation through Parliament under urgency, with no chance for public submission or comment, to establish the new Auckland Council as a legal entity, set up the agency which will oversee the transition, and constrain the decision-making powers of the existing councils and their subsidiaries.

“The government’s plan for a super city has mobilised the community and their concerns brought promises from government that they were listening. Yet today’s announcement simply legislates for their original proposal, so the promised listening was little more than political spin,” says Mayor Williams.

“Over the past two weeks our region’s mayors and other civic leaders have had a series of meetings with the Prime Minister, the Minister of Local Government and other Ministers based in Auckland electorates.”

“At those meetings and in our written correspondence we asked that the Ministers accept that all councillors on the new Auckland Council need to be elected from local wards, that the local boards be given some real teeth, and that local services be maintained in local hands.”

“Public meetings in the last few weeks across the Shore, attended by several of our local Cabinet Ministers, have very clearly highlighted that people are simply not comfortable with councillors elected at large, who could potentially all come from one political party or a specific section of Auckland. Our Ministers heard the public concern, assured us that these concerns would be taken to Wellington, but it would seem that the message has fallen on deaf ears,” he says.

Mayor Andrew Williams said he is dismayed that the legislation being rushed through under urgency will in effect render all Auckland councils impotent for the next 18 months.

“Local government for one third of New Zealanders, encompassing four of New Zealand’s five largest cities, will in effect be neutered by central government, leaving greater Auckland local government in limbo for perhaps two years, unable to fully deliver to their local communities. That’s not good news at a time when the economy is in a fragile state. In essence, central government is over-riding the 2007 local government elections by removing the ability of duly elected members in greater Auckland to govern as they were elected by the people to do,” Mayor Williams said.

Mayor Williams says that he and his council accept that there is a need for change in the regional governance structure of Auckland, because it is the high level regional issues that need addressing, not local council services which are working well. He will be urging North Shore residents to continue voicing their opposition to the government’s plans which remove local decision making and threaten the control of local services.  It is vital that this attack on local democracy is heard loud and clear at the parliamentary select committee and by our politicians.

At present our Cabinet Ministers seem to be forgetting the famous words of the Gettysburg Address which include “government of the people, by the people, for the people”. We will be reminding them of these basic democratic principles in the coming weeks.

ENDS

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