The Taxpayers’ Union is releasing the results of a survey that shows that the negative reaction from a few vocal mayors, councillors and LGNZ leaders is far from representative of the entire local government sector. In fact, roughly half of those participating in a survey of elected members back the Government’s proposals to get local government ‘back to basics’.

The survey asked elected officials whether they supported or opposed each of the four main policy announcements from the Prime Minister at last week’s LGNZ conference. For each policy, a net approval rating was calculated by subtracting those who oppose or strongly oppose the policy from those who support or strongly support it.

The results are as follows:

• There is a net approval of -1.33% for Cabinet’s decision to abolish the four wellbeing provisions in the Local Government Act and restore focus on local services and infrastructure. (225 responses)
• There is a net approval of +35.04% for Cabinet’s decision to investigate introducing consistent, easily accessible and comparable performance benchmarks for local councils, similar to the approach some Australian states apply to their local authorities. (177 responses)
• There is a net approval of 0% (meaning the same number support and oppose) for Cabinet’s decision to investigate options to limit council expenditure on ‘nice-to-haves’, such as by applying revenue caps to non-core activities. (177 responses)
• There is a net approval of +66.11% for Cabinet’s decision to review the transparency and accountability rules that apply to councils, which may include strengthening councillors’ right to access information from council officials. (177 responses).

Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, said:

“Our survey shows that elected representatives are far from united in their condemnation of the government’s latest announcements as the vocal few crowing to the media would have you believe.

“There is a relatively even split over the proposal to abolish the ‘four wellbeings’ to focus on getting back to basics and the proposal to limit expenditure on nice to haves. On the issues of benchmarking and improving transparency and accountability rules the results are clear – councillors support the changes the government is proposing.

“So while LGNZ and others jump up and down and kick up a stink, the results show that a substantial portion of those elected agree with the government’s sentiment. Perhaps LGNZ would be better to take a look in the mirror and realise they are misreading the room on this one – that would explain why so many councils are choosing to leave the organisation.”

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