Editorial - Tuesday April 9, 2013

Listen to the locals

It's a sad fact that rarely do those who make decisions on our behalf listen to local knowledge. Too often those with the power to make change promote their own agendas, or succumb to the mistaken belief that they know better than the people they supposedly serve.

There are plenty of examples of those phenomena, although the best we are likely to see for some time is offered by the politicians who led the charge to decriminalise prostitution a decade ago. This has not been the success we were promised; like the abolition of corporal punishment in schools (and more recently in the home), which was supposed to lay the foundations for a gentler society, the outcome in some communities has not so much fallen short of the promise but has produced the opposite of what was promised.

Former MP, mayor and street prostitute Georgina Beyer had the rare grace last week to concede that she had been naive when she championed the cause, in the belief that decriminalisation would spell the end of street prostitution. She admitted that she had been wrong, and now called on the Government to amend the 2003 legislation.

Others have remained silent. As they almost always do, the proponents of ill-conceived legislation have quietly disappeared. If they regret what they did they have no intention of making public admissions.

Street prostitution isn't an issue in the Far North, but decision-makers have two opportunities to listen to us, and act, even if not entirely in accordance with our wishes, with local views in mind.

The first of those is the process now under way to reform local government in the Far North/Northland. There will no doubt be a number of proposals to consider when the Local Government Commission's deadline falls on Monday, but already we in the Far North have two very different options to consider.

First there is Far North District Council's proposal to form a unitary authority in the Far North. Those who are behind the drive for "better local government" in the Far North, as represented by Mayor Wayne Brown and the Iwi Leaders' Forum's Rangitane Marsden, would have us believe that wide consultation has taken place, exposing a groundswell of support for a Far North unitary authority. That is open to debate. However many public meetings were called, the process launched last year represented nothing more than an outlining of what has become the formal proposal to the LGC, against a backdrop of dark mutterings that the structure of local government was going to change whether we liked it or not, that it would be preferable for the Far North to drive change rather than allowing it to be imposed, and that the only alternative to a unitary authority was rule by Whangarei.

That is not consultation. According to the proposal's harsher critics it was a grossly misleading campaign designed to panic constituents into supporting the plan for change. The process more recently adopted by Northland Regional Council is a very different kettle of fish. Derided by Mr Brown as it has been, NRC is at least offering a range of potential options, and inviting Northlanders to decide which has most appeal for them. At the end of the day it might all prove to have been a waste of time, but at least we are getting a say, of sorts.

Of sorts, because short of conducting a poll, the decision will effectively lie with the Local Government Commission. We do not yet know which option the commission might prefer, but dollars to doughnuts it will come down in favour of one unitary authority for Northland. That, even at this relatively early stage, would seem to be a rational conclusion. Certainly more rational than forming one unitary authority for the Far North and another for the remainder of the region. You'll get long odds on that outcome at the TAB.

At the end of the day, if enough Northlanders emerge from the torpor that generally takes hold when local government is the topic of conversation to demand a poll, we will have the chance to vote on how we want our councils to look. What we don't know at this stage is what the options will be should we get to vote, and to what degree local knowledge, needs and aspirations will be reflected in the options offered.

That's where the proposal submitted to the LGC by Hokianga man Michael Walker comes in. He is proposing a series of smaller, more local local authorities, councils (by whatever name) that, based on his experience (as opposed to theory), would not only be more responsive to communities but also more cost-effective.

He might have trouble with the latter point. Those who know best still seem to have absolute faith in the theory of economies of scale. Local experience might cast doubt on that, but local experience doesn't seem to count for much when it comes to making the decisions that matter.

These two proposals probably represent the extreme ends of the continuum, one seeking an all-powerful council that will do everything, the other a return to the days when smallish communities ran their own local authorities. The latter deserves strong consideration, but was probably doomed even before Mr Walker finished spelling it out. Going back to the past in any situation, however reasoned the arguments might be, does not represent progress, unfortunately. The only real hope probably lies in the LGC listening to those who can compare what we have now and what we had prior to the amalgamations of 1989, and making, or at least offering a decision that is genuinely in the best interests of the Far North/Northland as opposed to adding another amalgamation to the "progress" of local government in the region.

The other local issue where we should be praying that local knowledge will be heeded is the warning given in this newspaper last week over the future of Ahipara's paua fishery. Like local government, the history of fisheries management is hardly littered with examples of bureaucrats and politicians listening to what the locals tell them, and there is no reason to believe that that's going to change now.

Laurie Austen, who has been observing the Ahipara paua fishery almost all his life, has made a compelling case for the protection of a priceless resource that he believes, with good reason, to be on the verge of extinction. In the other corner stands the commercial paua industry, which he says has told a receptive Minister for Primary Industries that reducing the minimum size for harvesting would enable the industry to increase the fishery's value by $33.6 million a year. Of course it will have no value at all when the last paua has been harvested, just as Ahipara's commercial crayfish industry has little value after a handful of spectacularly lucrative seasons that decimated the resource.

Mr Austen asks the one question the industry won't want to answer - If the fishery is healthy and sustainable, why would a reduction in the minimum size be warranted?

Whether it be local government or the protection of fisheries, there are good reasons for local people to be involved in making decisions. For that to happen, however, local people have to make themselves heard. Too often we sit in silence, waiting in vain for others to do the sensible thing. In these two instances at least we should fight for what we believe is right.