What would the Wellington bureaucrats have to fill their day if they couldn't sit around coming up with bright ideas on how Aucklanders should spend our money?
After the latest brainstorm from Children's Commissioner John Angus, you have to think we'd all be better off if they just took a sickie when they felt one of these attacks coming on.
Dr Angus wants an adviser for children to take up residence in the super mayor's office and, to keep him company, an advisory panel for children be appointed. No doubt at whatever the going rate is for consultants, plus expenses.
He also wants the council and boards to consult children on policy issues, which suggests the advisory panel will not be made up of children but of "experts" who claim to know what children want.
A long-suffering bureaucrat of the Auckland persuasion muttered to me that if the kids could have one, then why not an advisory panel for middle-aged white blokes as well. I pointed out that as we seem likely to end up with a mayor and council that fit that description anyway, an advisory body telling them what they should be thinking might appear a tad superfluous.
What was rather predictable was that the two leading mayoral candidates, the "please everyone" twins John Banks and Len Brown, fell over each other to jump aboard Dr Angus's Buzzy Bee.
Mr Brown plans a regional youth council, a part-time youth adviser and a "kids' city policy".
There was no stopping the new inclusive, transmogrified Mr Banks. He isn't going to stop at a mere advisory panel for children, he plans panels for seniors and rural folk as well. And no doubt one for westies, Ponsonby lunchers, and one-armed paper hangers if they ask nicely.
With the seven council-controlled organisations running much of the show anyway, a social policy forum ordained by law but yet to be set up, Government-ordained panels for Maori, Pacific and ethnic groups, and now advisory panels pouring out their wishlists on every other topic under the sun, the new mayoral chambers seems set to become the 21st century Tower of Babel, rather than the streamlined centre of focused leadership we've been promised.
I'm all for a bit of consultation, but do we really need advisory panels for every squeaky wheel interest group in the community? And even if we do, how do we know that the chosen panellists are better representatives of an issue than the democratically elected councillors and board members?
For mayoral candidates promising to keep the rates down and run a lean ship, promising to create an iPad screen full of advisory "quangos" seems a strange way of doing it.
As former Attorney-General Sir Geoffrey Palmer discovered in 1985 when he launched his abortive "great quango hunt", and Finance Minister Michael Cullen rediscovered in the early 2000s, these bodies are like weeds. Kill one off and two sprout in their place.
To me, the simple solution is to starve them at birth. If the mayors can't resist setting up all these panels to hide behind, at least make membership strictly on a voluntary, service-to-community basis. No meeting allowances, no car mileage. Give them a cup of tea and our kind thanks for their public service. Dangle a Queen's Service Medal if you must. But that's it. That might keep the numbers down.
The Super City legislation requires the mayor to establish advisory panels for Pacific Peoples and "Ethnics". I've always presumed the latter expression encompasses all citizens of non-European descent other than Polynesians. But if you're going to be pedantic, why exclude the Dutch or the Dalmatians? The battle over representation on the Pacific panel shows how hard these things can be.
Dr Colin Tukuitonga, chief executive of the Pacific Island Affairs Ministry, has already caused turmoil by suggesting some of the Pacific panellists be appointed by Wellington. He has now called for submissions from interested groups before making the recommendation he has to prepare by November 1.
A Maori advisory board will also be set up, though Ngati Whatua have already indicated they will deal directly with the new council on an issue basis.
Let the advising begin.
<i>Brian Rudman:</i> Super-mayoral chambers set to be modern Tower of Babel
Cartoon / Peter Bromhead
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.
