Another View: Strategic stance on regional reform

Whangarei District Council made a strategic decision to submit to the Local Government Commission that it consider two unitary authorities in any reorganisation of local government in Northland.

Had we not put forward two unitaries, the commission may only have considered the options of the status quo (retaining all four Northland councils) or amalgamating them all into a single unitary authority.

Unitary authorities do the work of both a district and regional council, and so remove a layer of local government.

Our submission means the commission now has three proposals to consider - status quo, a single unitary authority or two unitary authorities.

Two meetings of ratepayers held by WDC supported an enhanced status quo model that really is little different from the status quo working as it should do, rather than as it does.

The Hawke's Bay application on the Local Government Commission website outlines all the reasons the enhanced status quo will not work and so should be rejected. Their reasons are compelling. Their application opts for a single unitary with five community councils, following the Auckland model. Should a single unitary be Northland's destiny, we can expect it would follow that structure too.

If the commission decides it wants consistency with local government restructuring throughout New Zealand, the Hawke's Bay proposal and Auckland model may be imposed on us.

The Northland Regional Council is advocating for a single unitary. We cannot see how this can be in the best interests of Whangarei ratepayers.

We fear it will result in cross subsidisation from Whangarei to the Far North. Their infrastructure backlog will become a burden on Whangarei ratepayers.

The other reasons supporting two unitaries are the tyranny of distance, the Far North not wishing to be run from Whangarei, and recognition of actual communities of interests.

At the WDC ratepayer meetings there were three major concerns which WDC has addressed in its application to the commission.

The fragmentation of ownership of Northport shares could result in a selloff with the present majority of shareholding lost - WDC nominates a single ownership entity to prevent a sell off by a rash council.

Lack of regulatory oversight over the new council - WDC recommends joint venture CCOs for regional transport, harbour master, regulatory matters, etc, so the game keeper/poacher separation remains.

Whangarei being landed with the Kaipara debt. The Hawke's Bay application clearly nominates that present debt remains within the present ratepayer area and so too does the WDC one. Accordingly, the Kaipara debt would remain the responsibility of Kaipara.

The commission is now considering all the applications it has received and will be designing a local body model for Northland. We understand the commissioners will be seeing the parties who submitted applications prior to finalising their new model. Once a proposal is developed it will be publicised and a full consultation and submission process held.

The commission will develop a final structure model which is either accepted or goes to a poll if 10 per cent of ratepayers call for one. In our debate on the issue, a good majority of WDC councillors supported the option of two unitary authorities for Northland.