New Northland Regional Council Chair Geoff Crawford. Photo / Michael Cunningham
Tears and accusations flew as the complete takeover of Northland Regional Council by a right-leaning five-person majority elected farmer Geoff Crawford as chair and former chair Tui Shortland as their new deputy chair.
Crawford was elected over a second nomination for now-former deputy chair Jack Craw during the explosive roughly two-and-a-half hours it took to totally change council governance. All voting by the nine-member council that made the change happen was dominated throughout by the five.
Hikurangi Swamp farmer Crawford, 56, is part of the quintet also made up of Te Rāki Māori Constituency representative and now deputy-chair Shortland, fellow farmers John Blackwell and Joe Carr, and Te Rāki Māori Constituency member Peter-Lucas Jones (Te Aupōuri, Ngāi Takoto).
Crawford said after his election to the top job at the meeting today he was excited to move the council forward.
He said the people of Northland would start to see things happen.
Meanwhile, Shortland said after her election to deputy chairshe was pleased to be in the new role. She resigned as chair in early November after saying her time in that position had become untenable, with that resignation effective from just after the start of today’s NRC council meeting.
The quintet achieved a clean-sweep removal of Craw and councillors Amy Macdonald, Marty Robinson and Rick Stolwerk from a raft of council and inter-council committees on which they had leading roles before today.
This included removing Craw from the council’s biosecurity and biodiversity working party.
Craw has had a 40-year career in biosecurity including working for the United Nations across the Pacific, the British government on Pitcairn Island, Australia’s Victoria state government, as an NRC staff member and as Auckland Council’s biosecurity manager.
He has had a key role in leading the fight against kauri dieback and the pest seaweed caulerpa and has been part of introducing 50 key achievement milestones into NRC’s biosecurity plan, against which achievement can be measured.
Craw is being replaced by Carr in a now divided council.
Meanwhile, Robinson was removed from Taitokerau Māori and Council Working Party (TTMAC) and his role as co-chair.
This was in spite of an email he tabled at the meeting that had been received from a representative of Te Runanga-Ā-Iwi-Ō-Ngāpuhi that sits with TTMAC and Te Takiwā o Ngāpuhi ki Whangārei trustee Janelle Beazley against this happening.
She said this opposition was supported by rūnanga chair Wane Wharerau and the trustees of Te Runanga-Ā-Iwi-Ō-Ngāpuhi, Te Rōopu Takiwā o Mangakahia, Ngāpuhi ki te Hauāuru, Ngāpuhi Hokianga, Taiamai ki te Marangai, Ngāpuhi ki Waitematā and Te Takiwā-Ō-Ngāphui-Ki-Te-Tonga-Ō-Tāmaki Makaurau.
He was replaced by Shortland.
Jones, who nominated Shortland for TTMAC, said she was the best person for this committee’s role.
Freshwater ecologist Macdonald was removed from her role as deputy chair and member of Northland’s groundbreaking inter-council governance-level joint climate adaptation committee.
Macdonald formerly chaired the latter committee, from which Craw was also removed.
Craw said Macdonald was nationally recognised for her work in climate adaptation.
Their replacements, Crawford and Blackwell, illustrate the council’s right-leaning leadership shift.
Craw was also removed from the heavyweight inter-council governance-level Northland civil defence and emergency management committee along with Stolwerk, who has been part of this group for a number of years. They were replaced by Crawford and Shortland.
The governance group’s right-leaning shift quickly played out when it came to making a decision on an agenda item where $750,000 from the council’s land management reserve was to be put towards resourcing the implementation of the council’s divisive and controversial Draft Freshwater Plan.
Crawford pushed to put this resourcing decision on hold until after Christmas and until the new Government had provided a clear indication on what direction it would be taking on the matter.
But after discussion, the council decided to only delay the issue until its next council meeting on December 12 and continue with the groundwork needed to set it up and meet implementation deadlines.
NRC is currently in the middle of public consultation over the draft plan.
■ Local Democracy Reporting is Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air