THE AUDITOR-General has given the Wanganui District Council's Long Term Council Community Plan (LTCCP) the big tick, unlike 19 local authorities who have fallen short. The report, tabled in Parliament last month, has picked out four councils. Invercargill City and Carterton, Timaru and Waitomo District councils all received what the Auditor-Generaltagged as "full adverse audit opinions". The report said all four fell well short of statutory obligations in their Long Term Council Community Plan (LTCCP) The 13 other councils named in the report came up short in other areas but were not regarded with the same seriousness as the first four. Among those was Horizons Regional Council, which came in for "minor qualification" with the Audit Office because its LTCCP summary "only partially complied" with the council's statutory responsibility "to disclose all major matters from its LTCCP. Wanganui Mayor Michael Laws yesterday said the report put the Wanganui council "in the upper echelon" for its long-term planning and community consultation. "The Audit Office has highlighted only the bad examples, not the good ones, basically saying this is the way not to do it. "Kevin Brady, the Auditor-General, told me last year he was very strong on name and shame. He said in 2003 a lot of councils, including Wanganui, got it wrong. "Wanganui didn't show an asset register, we had not inflation-indexed costs and we hadn't calculated our debt properly," Mr Laws said. "It's my understanding that, in line with Mr Brady's 'name and shame' threat, those 19 councils have drawn the ire of the Audit office." He said it cost the Wanganui council $50,000-60,000 to have the Audit Office audit our long term plan last year. "They literally had people here in our offices, in the weeks leading up to the draft report being published. So it's hard to stuff things up because they're looking over your shoulder all the time." Mr Laws took a swipe at Horizons and its shortcomings. He said it was another example of that council's "failure thinking in terms of consultation" now being reflected in the regional council's One Plan. "That's why the chief executives of seven district councils have approached Horizons complaining that their councils hadn't been given enough time to consult on this issue. And that's why our council has also decided to write to the Auditor-General about it. "It just seems to be that they can't get their public communications and consultation right."
