Council votes to lift CEO’s delegated authority by 166%!

Auckland Councillor Cameron Brewer says the Mayor and a clear majority of Auckland councillors voted to do the complete opposite of what ratepayers actually want when they agreed to lift the CEO’s delegated authority amount from $7.5m to $20m at today’s monthly Governing Body meeting.

“Increasing the CEO’s delegations by such a huge quantum is ill-timed at the very least. Ratepayers are screaming out for more financial and budgetary oversight, accountability and transparency - not less! But today the CEO’s financial authority was increased by a staggering 166%.

“This should be something for the next mayor and council to consider when they come sweeping into power in 16 months’ time with a renewed public mandate and some actual political capital. The outgoing current political leadership team should’ve left this for the next administration to decide next year, but apparently they know best.

“There was absolutely no need to rush this. It’s not the current delegations that are slowing this council down. The chair of the Tenders & Procurement Committee, Cr Dick Quax, pointed out today that his committee is managing and signing off the current non–delegated amounts well, and as a member of that committee I can vouch for that.

“What’s slowing this council down is the myriad of mindless none-core activity it involves itself in, not to mention the huge committee structure that remains in place. Ratepayers will be furious with the 166% increase of delegated power.

Before voting against it, I put up a generous amendment that attempted to strike a sensible balance between the public’s calls for us to have greater oversight on expenditure verses enabling the CEO and his executive leadership team to get on with the job. My amendment, which was lost 6/13, read:

Brewer/Quax: ‘Agree that given the current political climate, and the proximity of the 2016 election that the Chief Executives delegations are increased to $15m rather than the proposed $20million and that the joint delegated authority between the Chief Executive, the Mayor and the relevant Committee Chair be raised from $10million to $17.5million rather than the proposed $22.5million and that C and D are altered to accordingly.’

“Even doubling the CEO’s delegated authority was not enough for this Mayor and most councillors. Elected representatives instead handed management 166% more delegated authority. This again confirms they have a complete tin ear when it comes to what ratepayers want,” says Cameron Brewer.

ENDS

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