Waimakariri mayor says amalgamating North Canterbury ‘much more logical’ than a Greater Christchurch

Thursday, 11 June 2026

A North Canterbury council would be “much more logical” than joining Greater Christchurch, says Waimakariri mayor Dan Gordon.

Waimakariri mayor Dan Gordon says he would prefer to amalgamate with the Hurunui and Kaikōura district councils rather than merge with Christchurch city.

A North Canterbury council would be “much more logical” than joining a Greater Christchurch because they had a long history of working together, he told Newstalk ZB on Thursday.

“What happens here in Christchurch is quite different to what happens in our part of the world and I just don’t really want us to lose our identity,” he said.

His preference was to merge with Hurunui and Kaikōura over keeping Waimakariri a standalone council, as he said it was unlikely the Government would go for it.

Despite his personal preference, he said the council wanted to hear from residents before landing on a final position.

Gordon’s views come just over a month into a three-month process the Government sprung on the local government sector in May.

Councils have been told to either come up with their own amalgamation proposals, or risk central government making the decisions for them with a standardised process that does not yet exist.

The Waimakariri, Selwyn and Christchurch councils have begun asking residents for feedback in lieu of a formal consultation process, but where Waimakariri offers three clear options to choose from (no change, merge North or merge with Christchurch), Selwyn and Christchurch’s questions are more open-ended.

In the past fortnight, the Department of Internal Affairs released guidelines on what the Government expected from an amalgamation proposal, due August 9.

A key consideration for the Greater Christchurch area is how public transport, currently the responsibility of the regional council, would be divvied up if Christchurch, Selwyn and Waimakariri’s interconnected bus services were not managed by a single entity.

The DIA guidelines suggested something like a council-controlled organisation (Auckland has this in Auckland Transport) or joint committee could be created to deliver the service.