The Waikato River. Photo / Mike Scott
Five Waikato regional councillors who last year campaigned on pushing for the council to leave Local Government New Zealand have voted to stay.
Elected members voted yesterday on a motion to cancel the council’s $91,539.24 annual Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ) membership.
The motion was lost in a 10-3 vote, meaning Waikato Regional Council will stay a member of LGNZ until March 31 next year.
Those in favour of leaving were Noel Smith, who put forward the motion, Chris Hughes, who seconded it, and Garry Reymer.
Those against leaving and thus in favour of staying with LGNZ were Robbie Cookson, Mich’eal Downard, Ben Dunbar-Smith, Keith Holmes, Kataraina Hodge, Warren Maher, Gary McGuire, Jennifer Nickel, Liz Stolwyk and Angela Strange.
Tipa Mahuta’s vote could not be recorded due to technology issues.
The vote comes after seven councils, including Auckland Council and Christchurch City Council, have left LGNZ, saying it does not deliver value for ratepayers’ money.
Waikato Regional Council discussed leaving LGNZ in March last year.
In June, a resolution to stay with LGNZ was defeated, with five in support and six opposed.
A month later, the council voted on a motion to revoke that decision, which resulted in a 7-7 split and the chairman’s casting vote at the time was to remain with LGNZ.
During the last local body elections in October, a group of eight people campaigned as the Rates Control Team.
That team included elected councillors Maher, Downard, Dunbar-Smith, Hughes, Cookson, Reymer and McGuire.
On the team’s website, it was stated that one of their policies was to “Leave Local Government NZ”.
Yesterday, of the seven, only Hughes and Reymer voted to leave LGNZ.
While the team’s campaign website is still active, the part with their policies and their members has since been removed.
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union asked to speak at the meeting yesterday, but the council declined this.
LGNZ chief executive Scott Necklan was granted permission.
Necklan said LGNZ had worked with members across the country to hear about their priorities and needs to better advocate for members.
“It’s absolutely critical that every sector has a really strong voice ... particularly the regional sector, given the simplifying local government policy reform that’s underway at the moment.”
Ratepayer Brett Murphy, in a deposition at the meeting, said leaving LGNZ was a “no-brainer”.
“If you really do care about the poorest members of society ... then you should be taking every step to cut costs rather than flogging a dead horse like you’re currently doing,” Murphy said at the meeting.
Murphy voiced his disappointment with the five Rates Control Team members who voted to stay with LGNZ.
He said, in his view: “I have to say to you all that you’ve decided to go back on your word today, you’re not fit for any kind of office, and you would quite rightly deserve the reputation of being a grifter.”
Maher, who is the council’s chairman, said at the meeting that elected members had to make the “best decisions for the whole region” at a time of significant change for local government.
“It’s not only the restructure of the government, it’s the RMA [Resource Management Act reform].
“Not only can we push it [issues] with our own ministerial contacts, we can get local government [LGNZ] to drive that message in too. So there’s a real value.”
He admitted he was in favour of leaving LGNZ in the last triennium, saying in his view they “lacked regional advocacy” and were “financially inept”, but this had changed.
“The environment has changed since those pledges [for leaving LGNZ] were made.”
He said the changes LGNZ had made allowed for “a lot more regional input” and financially, they had “stepped up”.
Deputy chairman Downard said that although he originally intended to vote to leave LGNZ, he had done a lot of thinking over the last seven months.
“[LGNZ] are another tool to help us get … the best we can for the ratepayers.”
Dunbar-Smith said when he was campaigning, he signed a pledge to “oppose any measures that will see the total burden of rates, levies, and additional council charges exceed inflation and population growth”.
“We’re well under inflation at the moment. I continue to support controlling rates, and I will continue to do so.”
He said staying with LGNZ for one more year would allow the council to hold LGNZ to account.
McGuire said he changed his mind as the council needed “every tool in the toolbox”, but said it was “conditional”.
“If they’re [LGNZ] not … helping us with our farmers and our issues that we have here, then I would be the first to say, take the head off.”
Cookson said he had been “on the fence” through the whole process. He voted to stay, but wanted clearer guidelines in future.
Reymer said in his view, LGNZ’s deposition did not sufficiently specify what they had changed recently and he was unsure whether the changes were “meaningful or significant”.
“I’ve seen nothing to convince [or] change my thinking on it.”
Hughes said that to ratepayers, remaining with LGNZ would be a “betrayal of trust”.
“If you vote against this resolution to resign from LGNZ, I [respectfully] suggest you consider that vote is [at odds with] your aspirations to being a trusted politician,” he said.
“My advice is, don’t bother standing for public office in future.”
Malisha Kumar is a multimedia journalist based in Hamilton. She joined the Waikato Herald in 2023 after working for Radio 1XX in Whakatāne.