Council election information evenings are always very clear. Councillors are not well paid and they have a huge amount of work to do. Many find council a full-time role. In Hastings the base salary for councillors is $41,805.
Councillors have to be in the community constantly as well as undertaking their formal role as councillors. They are given vast amounts of material to read, and are constantly have to make important decisions that affect our community.
Our DHB representatives do not have quite the same amount of work as councillors, but they have a huge responsibility for the governance of the highest spending organisation in Hawke's Bay. There are significant potential problems with DHBs, and often board members are used by a minister to protect themselves from the anger of their local community over poor provision of health services.
DHB Board Members are paid $20,400 for what is an incredibly complex role. While board members do not have the time requirements of a councillor it comes with a large time commitment and a lot of responsibility. It is often harder to get good people to run for the DHB than it is to council because of this responsibility and the complexity of the role.
In marked contrast is the role of the Trustee of the Hawke's Bay Power Consumers Trust. Their role is not complex. It is not time consuming. They do not take the blame when the minister wants to pass the buck like DHB Board members do.
HBPCT trustees are paid $22,000. Their role is very straightforward. They attend approximately 15 meetings per year. They appoint directors. They approve the Statement of Corporate Intent. They receive the company dividend and decide what to do with it. They manage the ownership, reviewing ownership every five years. They attend an annual New Zealand Power Consumers Trust conference.
For all this they are paid more than a DHB member. They are paid half that our councillors are. Yet they do not have the responsibility of the DHB members for dealing with an incredibly complex issue, health spending. They do not have to make the huge time commitment that our councillors do.
The trustees will have a weasel-clause like an "independent evaluation" saying they are paid the market rates. Yet this is a community service role like the DHB and council, and in comparison to each of these organisations they are paid vastly more.
At this HBPCT election I will be voting for candidates who understand the value they provide to the beneficiaries of the trust and who will not accept the full amount paid to Trustees. I will be voting for those who pledge to review the payments made to trustees and benchmark these payments to the payments for councillors and DHB board members.
I will be doing this because I believe anyone who cannot see that they are seriously overpaid for a community service role like the HBPCT does not deserve to be elected.
They do not deserve to be taking money that could be returned to the community to line their own pockets, and they certainly do not deserve our vote if they use a weasel clause like an independent evaluation to justify how much they are paid compared to our councillors and DHB board members.
Simon Lusk is a Hawke's Bay-based political strategist and campaign manager. All opinions are the writer's and not those of Hawke's Bay Today.
