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A former Labour MP and North Shore councillor is warning that larger local government units are cutting out local and Maori participation.
Jenny Kirk says as councils get larger, it becomes harder for people who are not wealthy to become local councillors.
She says the Local Government Commission’s proposal for Northland, to replace the regional council and three district councils with a unitary council based in Whangarei, illustrates some of the most disturbing aspects of the trend.
She says the 10-member council will have the power to make all decisions.
“The community boards and the Maori boards may only recommend, report, provide information, advise, be a governance body for parks, libraries, etc, etc but not make any actual decisions which affect their local people.
"The Northland Council's obligations to the various community boards will be to provide them with information (and some funding), consult them on issues relating to that area, and seek their advice on council-wide plans and other strategies.
"There will be no obligation – as far as I can make out from the draft proposal – for the Northland Council to actually take into account that advice.”
She says the new council will become so remote from its people and the communities it is meant to serve, that it will be able to do anything it likes.
A similar amalgamation is proposed for Hawkes Bay, and Wellington/Waiarapa and Whanganui will have proposals put to them by the Local Government Commission some time later this year.
Ms Kirk says electors in one or more of the affected districts can call for a binding poll in the commission’s final recommendation.
The deadline for a petition in Northland expires on February 21, and on March 7 for Napier and Hastings.
Copyright © 2014, UMA Broadcasting Ltd
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