Brian Rudman: Waipareira's greatest shame is the lawyer's bill

Of all the dirty linen being waved about at the Waipareira Trust, the most depressing is the $80,000 bill from glass-tower lawyers Russell McVeagh. It was the fee charged for baby-sitting trust members during Douglas White QC's probe into the $195,000 golden handshake the trust paid former chief John Tamihere.

His successor, Reg Ratahi, is now demanding that as the Government ordered the inquiry, the poor old taxpayer should pay the $80,000. Nice try, Reg, but let's hope the sky falls in before that happens.

Instead, the trust's beneficiaries should be asking why their squabbling trustees have run up this extravagant bill rather than the money going on something useful, like ear grommets for sick kids, or reading recovery programmes.

Does it really cost $80,000 to hire a lawyer to hold your hand during an investigation into what happened at board meetings, four years ago? Even if we're talking the de luxe package, which includes a gentle kick to your shins under the table if you start to say something unwise, I'm sure there are plenty of competent Westie lawyers who would have done it for a fraction of this fee.

This comes fast on the heels of Tainui lodging a complaint with the Auckland District Law Society that a $122,000 bill from the same firm was excessive. I have no idea whether it was or wasn't. To me, what is excessive is the way organisations representing ordinary folk make a beeline for the most expensive legal advice other peoples' money can buy. I'm not talking just Maori groups, but just about any public body - local or national - you care to name.

Auckland City's symbiotic relationship with Simpson Grierson is a case in point. As is Transit New Zealand's with Chapman Tripp. Perhaps if the advice came with money-back guarantees, there might be a case for splurging public money on their silver salver service. But the only whisper I've ever heard of that happening was when shamed-faced Chapman Tripp got caught out over the 1915 act protecting Auckland's volcanic cones. As it happened, not only Chapman Tripp, but Simpson Grierson and every other legal expert in town failed to notice this mountain-saving little statute during the long saga over the motorway through Mt Roskill. Apparently, when the unpaid amateurs in the Volcanic Cones Society unveiled this little bombshell, Chapman Tripp volunteered to clean up the mess, on Transit's behalf, for nothing.

The recent landmark High Court case over the St James Theatre site, in which Justice Patrick Keane ruled that public scrutiny of major new building projects should be the norm under the 1991 Resource Management Act, was another slap in the face for the glass-tower legal experts. For years, they'd convinced councils secrecy was the way to go.

What these two random cases show is that expensive doesn't mean infallible. All it means is bone china at meetings and eye-watering bills later. In the 2003 financial year, Auckland City ratepayers paid high-rise lawyers $6.16 million in fees, $4.5 million of that to favourites Simpson Grierson.

Commenting on this figure in September last year, Mayor John Banks said the total, which was almost double the year before's, included a number of fees for one-off projects.

"You are not going to see another legal bill like that at Auckland City." He said the council would look at ways of bypassing expensive lawyers. Confusingly, the council yesterday said legal services fees for the year to June 30, 2003 were $4,608,989, and for June 2004, $5,541,725. Whether that's a rise, which Mr Banks said wouldn't happen, or a drop, I'm not sure. Either way, Mr Bank's pledge to bypass expensive lawyers should be vigorously pursued.

One way would be to hold annual tender rounds for the business. It's done for street cleaning, rubbish collecting and passenger transport services. So why not for legal advice?

And why not build up salaried in-house legal teams. At Waipareira Trust, perhaps if they'd had an inhouse lawyer down the corridor, they wouldn't be in their present pickle. And the grommet money wouldn't be flowing into rich lawyers' pockets.