25 August 2016
Media Release

Tasman joins sector submitting against proposed legislation

Tasman Mayor Richard Kempthorne has delivered a strong message today to the Local Government and Environment Select Committee that key aspects of the ‘Better Local Services’ Bill is both undemocratic and impractical.

While fully supporting the proposition that councils must deliver value to their communities, and of the importance of cooperating with neighbouring councils to achieve that, Mayor Kempthorne said councils around the country were united in concerns over the undemocratic provisions in the Local Government Act 2002 Amendment Bill. Better known as the ‘Better Local Services’ Bill, the Bill would allow the Local Government Commission to merge councils’ activities into Council Controlled Organisations without a mandate from the community or the consent of the councils concerned.

“The sweeping new powers proposed for the Local Government Commission threaten local democracy. The Commission can remove a community and council’s choice about service delivery arrangements while leaving the funding obligation with users and ratepayers – and the accountability with councils,” the submission says.

The submission also says the proposed changes may result in duplication of processes and diseconomies of scale. It appears that not enough thought was given to how the proposed changes would work in practice.

Mayor Kempthorne said shared service arrangements between councils intended to meet shared aims and reduce costs for ratepayers, could require Commerce Commission approval before the ‘Better Local Services’ provisions could be put into practice.

“It doesn’t make sense for the services councils are bound to provide to be subject to competition and pricing controls just because they decide to do it jointly, given the extensive public accountability requirements councils already have. We believe that also needs a lot more thought and should be addressed by the select committee before the bill is reported back to Parliament,” Mayor Kempthorne says.

ENDS

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