Rudman's city: Fletcher hits the roof over secret golden parachute

By BRIAN RUDMAN

If local authorities can undergo a constitutional crisis, then it's happening at Auckland City, where the reappointment of chief executive Bryan Taylor has become stalled over a secret golden parachute clause which was in his expiring contract.

Deputy Mayor Bruce Hucker, leader of the leftish City Vision team, and Doug Astley, his counterpart on the right, both accept legal advice that the retirement/severance payment - equivalent to six months' salary - should be rolled over into the new contract.

But Mayor Christine Fletcher, the third member of the contract subcommittee, strongly disagrees and has summoned councillors to a special meeting tomorrow to thrash out the issue.

Two weeks ago, city councillors voted nine to seven in favour of Mr Taylor continuing in his $300,000-plus job.

By law the jobs of local authority chief executives have to be advertised every five years. Auckland City went the whole hog, advertising the position worldwide in a search which attracted more than 30 contenders.

Four finalists eventually went through a gauntlet of interviews and other checks which included a session where councillors socialised with the hopeful's wives.

When it came to the secret council ballot, Mrs Fletcher, who was a member of the short-listing panel, rejected all four and abstained. The non-vote reflected her longstanding antipathy towards the incumbent.

After the council vote, Mrs Fletcher, Dr Hucker and Mr Astley began negotiations with Mr Taylor to finalise contract details.

It was only then that details of the golden parachute emerged.

Before that, councillors were aware of the need to give Mr Taylor six months' notice in the event of his employment being terminated.

But Mr Taylor argued that the $125,000 bonus was payable at the end of his present contract on July 1 this year, whether he was re-employed by the city or not. Mr Taylor was happy to forgo an immediate payout and have the clause added to his new contract.

Last Tuesday he apparently suggested it be a non-disclosable item, disguised as a "retirement gratuity." Mr Astley and Dr Hucker were prepared to sign. Mrs Fletcher however, refused. She stormed out, demanding councillors be consulted.

The secret golden parachute clause is no doubt embarrassing to existing Citrat councillors who were in power and agreed to it when Mr Taylor first joined the council from the private sector in 1989 and subsequently became chief executive in 1996.

These days such perks can be seen, as far as the public sector is concerned, as part of the unacceptable face of the Rogernomics era.

Presumably Dr Hucker, one of the leading anti-Douglas activists within the Labour Party in the 1980s, is also embarrassed at having inherited this hand-out obligation.

But he seems to have accepted legal advice that there is no option but to accept it.

Mrs Fletcher, on the other hand, wants all councillors to know what is going on. In a confidential report to tomorrow's special meeting she suggests councillors have three options:

Agree "that the bonus on termination" be paid on the expiry of his contract as recommended by Simpson Grierson Law.

Agree to Mr Taylor's request to carry the bonus into his new contract as a "retirement gratuity."

Refuse to pay out, claiming it was superseded by performance-based bonuses incorporated in the new contract.

From her first days in office, the mayor has been fulminating about the council bureaucracy and the need for accountability and responsibility at the top.

In an interview with me soon after taking office she talked of meeting "huge resistance" from officials when she arrived.

"They hadn't prepared, they hadn't anticipated there'd be a new mayor."

She also gave an ominous warning. "I have a gentle approach with people but I can be an old witch if they don't deliver."

The broomstick, it seems, is out.

Mrs Fletcher is rightly irate about the $125,000 retirement bonus clause, particularly when provision for superannuation is apparently also in Mr Taylor's package.

At the very least, the bonus should be disclosed in his contract. Then again, I suppose I've already done that now.

I await the whispers from tomorrow's meeting with interest.