‘Arm-to-arm combat’ avoided as 11 Canterbury councils gather to discuss future

Friday, 3 July 2026

Canterbury’s mayors and councillors have met in one room for the first time since the Government forced amalgamation talks, laying the groundwork for what comes next.

Environment Canterbury (ECan) councillor Nettles Lamont told the 100-strong group she wondered if they were going to need a space in the corner for “arm-to-arm combat” and admitted being “quite excited by the thought”.

However, it did not come to that.

Mayors, councillors and chief executives from all 11 councils between Waitaki and Kaikoura, along with mana whenua representatives, spent the day on Thursday at Lincoln University. Hosted by the Canterbury Mayoral Forum and ECan, participants heard about ECan’s role and how its services could be delivered under unitary authorities.

ECan will disappear in 2028 and its responsibilities, staff, assets and debt will be divided among a smaller number of merged district and city councils.

The Government wants Canterbury, which stretches from north of Kaikōura to the Waitaki River in the south, to have no more than three unitary councils.

In May, councils across New Zealand were given until August 9 to lodge merger proposals. If they fail to come up with their own plans, the Government has warned it will do so for them.

Councils have yet to formalise their plans, but Selwyn and Waimakariri mayors have already made it clear they do not want to amalgamate with Christchurch city.

Christchurch mayor Phil Mauger said this week that the city did not have any friends. On Thursday, after the Lincoln summit, he had still not managed to find any.

Mauger said he got a “few good things” out of the day, including hearing about the costs of delivering ECan’s services, including public transport.

They were also told about all the things that could go wrong with a unitary council, but Mauger said Nelson and Marlborough worked fine as unitary councils.

“A lot of us have complained about ECan, and I’m one of them, and here we are, the Government has given us an opportunity to do something, let’s take it with both hands.”

The media was invited to the summit for the last 10 minutes.

After the summit, Canterbury Mayoral Forum chairperson and Timaru mayor Nigel Bowen said he hoped people now had a better understanding of the regional functions and how they might fit into future entities.

There had been a lot of talk about boundaries, and not enough thought had gone into how ECan’s functions would be delivered, he said.

No governance models were decided during the summit, but the Canterbury Mayoral Forum would meet on Monday to discuss the amalgamation further.

Bowen said there was “tension in the room”, but there was also a “genuine want and desire” to put together a joint proposal for Canterbury.

Each council would make its own decisions and submit its own proposals to the Government, but the forum wanted to endorse those proposals, Bowen said.

When asked how the forum would negotiate a situation where some councils like Christchurch, Selwyn and Waimakariri could not agree, Bowen said “with a lot of stress”.

He said he was optimistic another month of conversations would help the situation, but also conceded there might be things they do not fully agree on.

ECan chairperson Deon Swiggs said it was good to share knowledge and support the transition.

Regardless of the make-up of the new entities, ECan’s functions needed to keep going, he said.

“Success to me today is that everyone walks away with a better knowledge base to make good decisions.”