New plan by new year: Mayor Tory Whanau sets line in the sand
Thursday, 17 October 2024
Wellington mayor Tory Whanau came out of a meeting with Local Government Minster Simeon Brown on Thursday morning setting herself a 76-day deadline to form a new long term plan.
Senior ministers have in the past few days ‒ after the council essentially voted down selling its 34% airport stake meaning the 10-year plan will have to be redone ‒ sent strong signals a Crown intervention looms.
Brown on Thursday morning said he expected advice back on whether the current council situation warranted government intervention within “coming days”.
Speaking to Stuff at Wellington Airport, Brown said Whanau offered 'an explanation' but he remained concerned that the council's inability to settle on a long term plan could lead to rates rises.
'The reality is that when a council is relitigating an entirety of its long term plan that could have a significant impact on ratepayers. That is concerning,' he said.
Whanau went into the meeting with Brown at Parliament just before 8.30am on Thursday, saying she had a plan.
She came out of the meeting saying no talk of intervention came up during the meeting but pledged that the council would have a reworked long term plan by the end of the year. She said it would be one that managed insurance risk but delivered for Wellington.
Coming out with a new plan would mean coming up with a draft amended plan, publicly consulting on it, debating it through an infamously fractured council with wildly competing views on spending, and voting it in – all within 76 days. Those days include the start of the traditional summer break.
But councillor John Apanowicz, who accompanied Whanau to the meeting later clarified the mayor was not that ambitious. He said the actual pledge was to come up with a draft amended plan pre-Christmas with consultation running alongside the next year’s annual plan process, which has to be delivered by the end of June.
Whanau selected to go to the meeting with councillor John Apanowicz, the architect of the doomed Reading Cinemas deal.
The Government’s options on the table range from sending an observer to oversee the council, through to firing all elected members and appointing a commissioner to run the show. Or, in a move backed by councillor and mayoral hopeful Ray Chung, the council elections for next year could potentially be brought forward.
Wellington-based Finance Minister Nicola Willis on Thursday said a decision on intervention sat with Brown but the Government respected democracy,
“This is the council that Wellingtonians voted for,” she said.
“It's my view, though, that there wasn't anyone who voted for dysfunction.”
Councillor Tony Randle backed the idea of an observer.
“I don't think it would be the end of the world if something like that happened. It's the minister's decision, though.
“He's trying to judge what's right for Wellington. And, you know, we've tripped up a few times, and for that you get, you know, put on detention, don't you?”
Brown has commissioned advice on “exactly what potential intervention steps are” and will look at next steps when that came back.
Thursday’s meeting at Parliament followed an urgent council meeting called by Whanau on Wednesday to sort out a solution.
A last-minute proposal to stave off the Government hounds was put forward by a councillor at the forefront of stopping the controversial airport share sale ‒ Nureddin Abdurahman.
The shares were to be sold to set up an investment fund to give the council cover for after a disaster. But Abdurahman said the advice on the size of the problem, from staff, had changed drastically through the process.
“Figures given by officers around debt headroom needed have changed multiple times over the past four months with limited ability to scrutinise,” he said.
Housing Minister and Hutt South MP Chris Bishop on Wednesday told The Post the scenes out of the council were “frankly shambolic and people are very frustrated in Wellington”.