David Thornton – writer, commentator on Local Government
 

MEDIA RELEASE   11 Dec 2009

Citizens of SuperCity Auckland will have local democratic representation cut in half by Local Government Commission.

I have today made a submission to the Local Government Commission asking it to improve its proposals for the new Local Boards so as to give adequate representation for citizens in the New Auckland Supercity..

The existing representation ratio across greater Auckland is one elected member per 5,152 population – this takes into account all existing elected offices of  mayor, city, regional and district councillor, and community board member.

Under the Commission’s draft proposal this ratio, on the same basis, changes to 1;9,638 – in effect reducing representation by half.

Total elected members, mayor, councillors and board members, will drop from 275 to 147 – while local government non-elected staff numbers have increased by more than 30% over the last six years.

There is no directive from the Government or Parliament for such a drastic reduction in local democratic representation - and there is no explanation from the Commission for this reduction.

With an entirely new governance structure it is essential to have too many Board members rather than too few – noting that the Commission’s decision on numbers will effectively hold until after the 2013 local elections, and the next representation review could be deferred to 2018,

I suggest that the Commission sets a  representation ratio of between one elected member per population of 5,000 [1:5,000] and 1:7,000. Even that range is considerably greater than representation ratios across Europe which range between 1:118 in France to 1:2,603 in the UK

I am also concerned at the uneven size of Boards across the region and believe that the Commission should review its draft decision to set a population threshold at 53,000, and consider instead a maximum population size for Boards of , say 70,000, with a minimum of 40,000.  

ends

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