Brian Rudman: Democracy rules, and boundaries kept away from politicians

At last a victory for democracy. All 20 councillors of the Super City's governing Auckland Council are to be elected on a ward basis.

Best of all, decisions on boundaries and the numbers of wards are to be removed from the whims of politicians and placed in the hands of the independent Local Government Commission.

The royal commission's original proposal for representation was unfair at all sorts of levels with its convoluted mix of 10 councillors elected at large, eight elected from four urban wards, two from rural wards, and three Maori members - two elected and one appointed.

The Government then came up with a couple of equally muddled recipes of its own - both involving a mix of "at large" and ward councillors.

The select committee has accepted the overwhelming demand from Aucklanders for a full ward system and, to its great credit, defied the wishes of the Prime Minister and his Cabinet colleagues, and agreed.

As a sop to their Cabinet masters, the National majority on the committee couldn't resist "authorising and encouraging" the commission "to establish multi-member wards where this would provide for a better fit with communities of interest". But hopefully, the commission will toss that authorisation in the rubbish bin.

Even with 20 single-member wards, each ward will be larger than a parliamentary electorate. If anything Auckland needs more wards to represent communities of interest, not fewer.

If the full ward system is the good news, the bad is the lopping of the region's existing north and south boundaries because of clamour from a few locals. If there are to be any boundary changes at the fringes, Parliament should insist that they too be left to the independent Local Government Commission.