New legislation will not alter councillors’ instincts
Veteran Wellington councillor Robert Shaw casts a critical eye over the submissions to the local government Bill currently before a Select Committee.
Do we trust them? That is the key question when legislators enact local government legislation.
New Zealand’s first real local government Act, the 1842 Municipal Corporations Ordinance, began two traditions - first, was the tradition of subservience and second was that of excessively lengthy and prescriptive legislation. These traditions are obviously related.
After 160 years we are about to break local government’s subservience to central government. It is a bold, logical and progressive step.
Helen Clarke rightly demands that local government matures and contributes more to our well being, and regional growth.
You alter the balance of power between central and local government if you give local government more ability to address economic, social and environmental issues.
Government has pursued the model of “local – central partnerships” with some success in business development, and in an offbeat way in education and health. But, to enshrine overlapping responsibilities in local government legislation is still a bold move.
The reason we cannot get health and education right is because we believe in two contradictory principles. On the one hand we believe in local solutions to local problems and having decisions made at the coalface. On the other hand, we believe the taxpayer should pay for these things and thus we support centralised accountability regimes. Hence, accountability lines are faint, no one has their butt on the line, and we tolerate inefficiency.
Local government is different. The money is sourced locally and thus the centralist pull is much less. It has been the prescription of function that has made local government subservient, supported by constraints of funding. Now the Executive’s hold on local government is to be largely replaced by the velvet glove of “the community”.
To make this democratic, and restrain excesses, a plethora of controls are being suggested for the Act.
Before, it was central government politicians and bureaucrats who did not trust local government. Now it is the locals that want to apply the brakes. The locus of mistrust shifts.
For example, property owners seek protection from hoards of impoverished voters. Property owners provide the money, but the community at large decides how it is spent.
Business ratepayers look for protection from already grumbling, residential ratepayers. Every dollar business provides is a dollar the householder does not have to pay.
The community-at-large seeks to be protected against those elected by imposing codes of conduct for councillors and penalties for creative decision-making.
Would you believe some sought mechanisms to protect councils from other councils? In particular, the territorial authorities wanted to constrain the regional councils.
Finally, timid councillors in the Wellington region discussed their own protection from their elected colleagues whom they deemed to be “errant” councillors.
Trust is a scare commodity when we draft legislation. Clear, simple provisions could again be sacrificed because we do not trust each other and groups seek to protect their particular vested interest.
However, it is all a bit of a rain dance. Recent history shows how ineffectual legislation really is when it is designed to curb councillors’ instincts.
When the Number 3 Amendment Bill was first mooted it had two vital purposes: first, to make “transparent” who benefits from services paid for by ratepayers; second, to bring a significant element of “user pays” into local government.
The complex steps now enshrined in law, with ample use being made of economic concepts, have had little practical effect.
I have the strange distinction of being the only councillor to serve on two of the councils that initially tried out the new legislation. Porirua’s Labour Council was understandably hell bent on circumventing the original intention of the Act. “User pays” was anathema to these feisty old-world socialists - they opposed the Bill and showed creativity in the Act’s implementation.
At the Wellington Regional Council the same outcomes were obtained, but not for ideological reasons. They applied all the principles in the new Act logically and fairly – and produced a conclusion that altered nothing. There was a gain in transparency for those few cerebral councillors who concentrated throughout the ordeal. But, let us be clear – very few members of the public understand the system, and even fewer have examined its operation in relation to a particular expenditure.
With a purpose-selected committee of shrewd residents, I examined the transport funding policy of the Wellington Regional Council just over a year ago. The conclusion was that there were many different decisions that could legitimately be made and to alter the policy in a rational way would require a substantial policy project that could not be justified. Hence, council stayed with the “best guess”.
Today, Porirua City residents’ associations seek to fully participate in the revision of council’s funding policy. They have held three public meetings already and plan others. It is great to see their initiative. Without a doubt the process will inform people.
But, the residents bring an agenda - they want to reduce property tax. Sadly, I know, at the end of the day, the elected councillors are in another space. The councillors want to “develop the city” and spend money. If they did not, they would not take ratepayer funded trips to China, Japan and Australia.
The new Act will free the local government sector from the tethers of central government, but it will not alter the best or the worst instincts of councillors.
Robert Shaw is in his fourth term as elected councillor and is a senior lecturer in business management at The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand.