Mai Chen: Hey Cabinet, we really need to talk

When Auckland and Wellington don't work together, Aucklanders feel the fallout. Photo / Dean Purcell

With rapidly growing and changing demographics, the nation’s largest city has issues distinct from the rest of the country — but it will take structural changes within the government to get Auckland properly sorted

Doug McKay's just released report on how central government can operate more effectively for Auckland is important. Many Aucklanders I meet just want government to stay out of their business, but that's not realistic: government regulates everything and spends our taxpayer dollars, including for providing essential services. It's too important to ignore.

So does it matter that the most important body, Cabinet, that makes all the big decisions about public policy, what laws to send to Parliament to create or change, and how public money is spent, only sits in Wellington? And that most officials advising government are in Wellington? I think it does matter, and it needs to change, despite some ministers and officials living in Auckland.

The reason is that government is really important and it needs to better understand and accommodate Auckland's differences from the rest of New Zealand; those differences are only going to get more pronounced over time. The reason is the rapid demographic changes as well as the momentum that Auckland Council is gathering through greater cohesion and size.

As Mr McKay points out: "This does not mean that different places should have preferential treatment. It just acknowledges that some issues play out with greater complexity, effect and scale in certain places, and that unique features of the local environment - density, availability of partners, complicating factors - are part of the policy landscape."

Auckland looks different to other regions. Europeans make up only half of the Auckland population (compared to three-quarters in the rest of New Zealand). Asian and Pacific peoples comprise a larger share of the population than Maori. Sixty-five per cent of New Zealand's Pasifika community lives in Auckland.

Almost 40 per cent of Aucklanders were born overseas (the third highest rate in the OECD). One third of Aucklanders speak languages other than English, and many maintain active connections to their places of origin, including sending remittances home. Auckland's demographic transformation is still underway: it is estimated the Asian population of Auckland will grow by 130,000 in the seven years to 2021. Asians are projected to comprise half of Auckland's population growth in the next 20 years, and Pacific people 22 per cent. Auckland is a Pacific Rim city, and an Asian one. In the near future most Aucklanders will be younger, and Asian, Maori or Pasifika. The differences between Auckland and the rest of the country will widen.

Who is advising government on what impact these differences in Auckland should have on policies and laws? How does this affect the type of services needed and what about access to those services? How does government need to communicate differently with Aucklanders and the new New Zealand? How do we promote cohesion, facilitate social mobility and reduce intra-community tension in the face of rapid demographic change?

When Auckland and Wellington don't work together, Aucklanders feel the fallout, whether that's in the housing market and on congested roads. But so does New Zealand in terms of economic indicators. As Mr McKay points out: "Auckland can be a fiscal opportunity or a fiscal drag." That's why Mr McKay's recommendations are important. But I would respectfully argue they don't go far enough. They deliberately don't create the formal structural mechanism for Wellington to talk to Auckland that Rodney Hide told me he regretted leaving out of the legislation to create the Super City. Mr McKay says "that leadership directed to empower people and set the right behaviour leads to gains quicker than changing structures and systems". What we currently have is an Auckland Policy Office. We've had it for 10 years, but it has grown out of a public service department chief executive's initiative - it has not been driven by ministers. So it remains an office for departments who want a policy presence in Auckland, a facility where ministers and officials can meet with Auckland, and as a way to provide a system-wide view of Auckland.

It needs more firepower and more status if it is to help drive national economic growth and better public services targets that deliver real results for Auckland and New Zealand, which is the focus of Mr McKay's report.

Mr McKay's recommendations are pragmatic and designed for Wellington public service chief executives to implement within their existing portfolios, like creating a cohort of double-tiered senior leaders in priority departments, such as health, education, social development, MBIE, Treasury and transport - who are focused on Auckland. As Mr McKay explains: "Stewardship responsibilities for Auckland should sit at the executive table and at the heart of central government decision-making".

Mr McKay also recommends adopting a "spatial lens" to develop and implement policy: where central government priorities manifest most, and earliest, in the Auckland region, "a concerted focus on Auckland is the straightest path to achieving the national-level objective". He also says we should enhance the role of the Auckland Policy Office.

Mr McKay's recommendations need implementing, but the leadership needs to come from the Prime Minister and his senior ministers. I think Cabinet needs to sit in Auckland on a regular basis - not just the occasional one-off strategy session - and be advised on law and policy by more officials who are Aucklanders.

We all want to end the year on a triumphant note and have hope for the New Year that it will be better. The New Year should be about ensuring Auckland's success, which all New Zealand can leverage off.

Doug Mackay Review of Central Government Policy, Implementation, Strategy and Leadership Effectiveness in Auckland. Report for Chief Executives Governance Group.

• Mai Chen is author of the Public Law Toolbox, the second edition of which will be on sale on December 17.