22 January 2007

Debate to be held on Tonga decision

An emergency council meeting will soon be held to discuss the decision by Manukau Mayor Sir Barry Curtis to commit ratepayer resources to rebuilding efforts in Tonga.

Howick Councillor Jami-Lee Ross says the extraordinary meeting of the Manukau City Council will be held on Tuesday 30 January after he and other unhappy councillors demanded a say on the controversial decision.

"I have delivered a letter to the Chief Executive Officer on behalf of myself and six other councillors calling for an emergency meeting to discuss the proposal to send council staff to Tonga."

Signatories to the letter include councillors Jami-Lee Ross (Howick), Dick Quax (Botany-Clevedon), Bob Wichman (Papatoetoe), Neil Morrison (Pakuranga), David Collings (Pakuranga), Jan Sinclair (Botany-Clevedon), and Sylvia Taylor (Mangere).

"It is our opinion that a commitment of ratepayer resources should never have been made to the Tongan Government without first being approved by a meeting of the council," says Mr Ross. "We are very concerned that the proper democratic process was not followed by the Mayor when he made this decision."

Mr Ross says he believes that council staff should not be sent to work for overseas governments while there is plenty of planning work that needs doing at home.

"The staff of the Manukau City Council are employed to provide services to the residents and ratepayers of Manukau City, not Nuku'alofa in Tonga. By committing council staff to do work in a foreign country the Mayor and chief executive are taking staff away from their normal council responsibilities.

"Like many other local authorities, we are struggling to employ enough town planners to process resource consent applications on time and we simply can not afford to lose staff in this area."

Mr Ross encourages concerned residents and ratepayers to attend the emergency council meeting to demonstrate their opposition to the Tongan assistance proposal. The meeting will commence at 5pm in the Manukau City Council chambers.

The councillors have proposed the following motions for debate at the meeting:

1. That Council declines the request to send a delegation of Council staff to Tonga to assist with rebuilding of Nuku'alofa.

2. That Council express concern that the Mayor and acting Chief Executive Officer made a commitment to the Tongan Government without first seeking approval from Council.

3. That all future requests or proposals for overseas assistance shall be referred to a meeting of the full Council for decision.

Mr Ross says that the proposed motions allow the council to formally discuss the commitment made by the Mayor and clearly indicate how such a decision should have originally been made.

"We want to ensure that situations like this are avoided in the future and send a clear message to the Mayor that he should not be committing ratepayer resources to foreign governments without first seeking council approval."

"I also expect that the Chief Executive Officer will be postponing all travel arrangements to Tonga until councillors can make a decision at the emergency council meeting."

ENDS

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