Samantha Motion: Analysing a year of petty politics in Tauranga

Happier times: The new council after being sworn in last year. Photo / File

COMMENT

It's just so embarrassing.

A special meeting about the behaviour of Tauranga's elected members. A Crown team to review and monitor the council at who knows what cost. A mayor accused of being agro, councillors accused of plotting against him, humiliating texts, secretly recorded meetings.

How did one of New Zealand's fastest-growing cities get here?

Mount Maunganui/Pāpāmoa councillor Steve Morris, initiator of a call this week for mayor Tenby Powell to resign, traced it back to early rates discussions in March and Powell's infamous profane tirade at first-term councillor Andrew Hollis.

I would take it further.

There is too much water under the bridge for an exhaustive list of contributing factors, but in my view, these are the key events that lead us here.

The campaign

In May last year, rich-lister Tenby Powell - business leader, military man - scootered down from Auckland to Tauranga to run for mayor of his hometown.

With the not-very-subtle slogan "Tauranga deserves better", it was no surprise his campaign strategy included a fair bit of slagging off the local political establishment and their work.

Shockingly, some members of said establishment didn't like that.

There were skirmishes on the campaign trail. At one event Powell said he would not want to work with some incumbent candidates - a statement at odds with his promise to unify the council and city.

In any case, Powell's pitch won over voters. On the night of his election win, he called for the city's "old guard" to step down.

But they were already primed to continue the battle.

Tauranga mayor Tenby Powell and then-deputy mayor Larry Baldock. Photo / File

Larry Baldock's appointment

Powell had few realistic options when it came to choosing a deputy. Picking former United Future MP Larry Baldock, however, waved a red flag to the bulls.

Baldock had the experience to offset Powell's local government inexperience, but the selection ignored history and sent a message to the rest of the council that was anything but unifying.

In his Tauranga political career, Baldock routinely locked horns with some of the re-elected councillors including Morris and John Robson.

The selection could also be viewed as a bit of an insult to Kelvin Clout, who two previous Tauranga mayors had considered a safe pair of deputy's hands even though he ran against them.

Powell was lucky he didn't face a vote to remove Baldock on the spot.

That came later.

The May 19 meeting

The May 19 council meeting set off a brief, damaging contest to see who could use obscure rules most cleverly to score political points.

Councillors were already complaining about Baldock's chairing of informal meetings, so his use of Standing Orders to initiate an early end to a debate about Elizabeth St went over as well as you'd expect.

Three councillors walked out and others protested. Comments at the time - and texts and emails released later - appeared to reveal fury on what was framed as an assault on democracy and free speech.

In my opinion, setting aside the irony of Baldock acting as the meeting efficiency enforcer after spending hours serenading the microphone in the last term, the bungled move just seemed pointlessly petty.

The protest walkout by Morris, Hollis and first-term councillor Dawn Kiddie that followed wasn't much better.

It's hard to do a good storm-off over Zoom.

Shortly after came the "letter of requisition" from six councillors (including the walk-outs), lodged under the Local Government Act and, again, those pesky Standing Orders, seeking a meeting to remove Baldock as deputy mayor.

It was a move aimed at damaging Powell as much as Baldock, trying to force him to accept a deputy of the council's democratic choosing - Robson, most likely - rather than his own.

The "democracy" argument held little water with me - saddling the mayor with a deputy he would not trust seemed like a recipe for making him less inclusive, not more. It was simply another way to get at him.

Before the meeting could be held, Baldock fell on his sword and resigned, and Powell convinced Tina Salisbury to take the hospital pass.

Another letter of requisition, on principle, followed and fell over shortly after, when Clout the Peacemaker withdrew support. The next meeting sorted out pay equity issues and gave Robson a spot on Smartgrowth, a collective of local councils and other groups.

The first meeting of the new Tauranga City Council. Photo / File

The LGOIMA

That might have been the end of it, for the time, if it wasn't for the LGOIMA.

Tensions simmered back down, and the council made it through the Annual Plan budget setting process with barely a scrap, no evidence of bloc-voting.

But a few weeks later an official information request response containing hundreds of elected members' texts and emails from the tense May/June period was released, publicly.

The grim reality of the relationships and thoughts of some elected members was exposed to a degree rarely seen in local politics. It was headline news, splashed on Facebook and widely embarrasing.

It set off new waves of anger and escalating public accusations, and here we are.

Where to now

What this city has seen this past year has been a staring match of sorts, to see who would blink first.

Would it be the mayor with a bit of a temper, an expectation his colleagues should back his progressive agenda and a divisive (former) deputy?

Or the sect of spurned councillors, ignored, annoyed and seemingly willing to weaponise every misstep - or deliberate slight - to their own ends?

In the end, it was the Department of Internal Affairs that forced a blink.

There were some encouraging signs in yesterday's meeting - including Powell's promise to work on his reactionary tendencies - but I also saw little evidence of anyone forgiving and forgetting. Grudges continued to be nursed.

But this is their last chance.

If they can't find a way to stop the personal attacks and petty politicking to focus on the work at hand, in my opinion they've got to go.