Eleven remits have been set down for debate and voting at the 2020 Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ) Annual General Meeting (AGM) to be held this Friday 21 August.

The AGM, postponed from July, will be held remotely and will enable all 78 member councils to vote on both the remits, as well as a new LGNZ president and vice-president. Due to the Covid crisis, LGNZ’s 2020 Conference, usually held over the same period as the AGM, has been postponed until 2021.

LGNZ President Dave Cull says that the remit process is important as it enables ground-up policy making to address a range of issues affecting New Zealand’s communities.

“Remits are the lifeblood of any membership organisation as they enable members to directly inform advocacy,” says Mr Cull.

“LGNZ believes in ground-up policy making that allows local people to deliver their own local initiatives and solutions, and remits are a great way to enable this.”

The remits cover policy areas including public transport, housing, climate change and rates. While some remits are completely new, others confirm and update existing policy.

New remits include:

· Returning GST on rates to councils to spend on infrastructure;

· Extending the local government electoral cycle from three years to four;

· Placement of a moratorium on water bottling;

· Extending emergency legislation that allowed councillors to be included in the quorum when connecting remotely to a council meeting; and

· Development of an annual regional balance of transfers, to show how much each region contributes in taxes, and how much each region receives in government funding.

The LGNZ AGM is open to members only. Remits are voted on in a secret ballot, and once passed become official policy to be actioned by LGNZ.

A full list of the remits can be found here.

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