Tory Whanau: Time for the PM to stop taking cheap shots at councils

Sunday, 25 August 2024

Central and local governments at odds over spending

Tory Whanau is mayor of Wellington.

OPINION: Councils across the motu met here in Wellington this week as part of the annual Local Government NZ conference.

The focus of this week’s conference was localism done well and how to solve growing problems that are intergenerational and decades in the making. Issues of buckling infrastructure, our changing climate, and housing instability for our people.

The speech our prime minister gave and my feelings about it have been well covered in the media this week. It announced four new proposals in an attempt to get us to “focus on the basics” like water infrastructure and waste.

With respect Prime Minister Luxon: we already are. Wellington City Council (WCC) in our recent Long-term Plan is investing $1.8 billion into water, a massive 68% increase. We also are transforming our waste system by introducing a household organic waste collection service and other changes to reduce emissions and thousands of tonnes of waste going to landfill.

PM Christopher Luxon speaks at the Local Government NZ conference on Wednesday.

Not to mention, we are solving our insurance problem by transferring our minority holding in airport shares. Not going running to the Government asking for a handout as he suggests.

I felt very strongly that the speech missed the opportunity to talk about how we solve our shared problems, and instead punched down, telling us to ‘tighten our own belt’.

It's clear the prime minister wants to run our country like a business, but we're not a business. We're a community of people who have community-related needs.

The reality is there’s no more fat to trim if we are going to fix up our key infrastructure whilst also building a city that is thriving and resilient for generations.

Rates have jumped up across councils all over the country, whether they be left-leaning, right-leaning or otherwise. This synchronised rates rise has not happened in a vacuum.

WCC, like all other councils, has found savings to shave millions of dollars off our books, through scaling back and deferring projects. A huge amount of work has gone into finding this balance where we deliver for our city while managing a rates burden on our people. For example, we cut $80 million from the cycleway network over the next 10 years and have found a much more efficient and lower-cost way to deliver this programme. We are certainly doing our part.

Wellington Mayor Tory Whanau speaks at the LGNZ conference on Wednesday.

More than just being offensive and wrong, what was signalled by the Government would be a huge overreach in local decision-making, and the influence our communities will be able to have over future decisions they voted for.

Changing legislation to narrow the remit of local government to infrastructure and investigating options to limit council expenditure on “nice-to-haves' is the opposite of localism.

What central government doesn’t seem to understand is that, unlike them, local government has one of the most rigorous, open, and transparent decision-making systems. We go through rounds of consultation. This year WCC held a first-ever Citizens Assembly.

The things we are funding reflect what local residents tell us they want.

Those priorities will be different in Wellington than in Central Otago and that’s why we have local government to make those decisions, rather than a one-size-fits-all approach from the Beehive.

For example, investing in making our CBD attractive and feel safe, to address city safety, is something residents tell us is a top priority. But it seems to be considered a “nice to have” under the Government’s proposals.

Business support and encouraging economic development for local businesses is also a top priority right now as Wellington struggles with the impact of public sector cuts. But again, it seems the prime minister could consider this a “nice to have”.

I do have one idea for cutting unnecessary spending though. Thanks to the Government, next year Wellington will be forced to spend up to $200,000 to hold a referendum on the Māori Ward we already have. To me that is wasteful spending, as it is clear Wellingtonians value Māori having a voice at our council table.

While it’s easy for the prime minister to take cheap shots at councils because it plays well in the headlines, I implore him to look around.

Every council in Aotearoa is struggling. We are all grappling with decades of artificially low rates and neglected infrastructure. And we are all here, ready to work together in true partnership for a thriving Aotearoa.

What do you think? Email sundayletters@stuff.co.nz. Please include your full name and address.