More supercities on way

Ron Mark fears the Government has amalgamation plans. Photo / APN

The country's cities could take control of small-town New Zealand, as ministers investigate the biggest nationwide council shake-up in nearly 25 years.

The mayors, councillors and staff of the smallest and most "vulnerable" districts could be left without jobs, as their councils are subsumed into bigger neighbouring towns.

There are already talks of merging the Wellington, Porirua, Upper Hutt and Hutt cities into a capital supercity modelled on the Auckland Supercity.

Now, a report obtained by the Herald on Sunday reveals details of a "comprehensive review" of local government that is to go to the Cabinet Economic Growth and Infrastructure Committee next month.

The report proposes reshaping "vulnerable districts", particularly rural and smaller provincial councils.

David Wilson, director of the institute of public policy at AUT, said the review was pitched at improving local governance - but, in reality, small towns should be worried.

At stake, he said, was the opportunity for ratepayers to "bump into their representative in the supermarket".

The Government will begin consulting on the review this month, and Wilson will use that opportunity to warn that imposing a supercity model on smaller communities - "especially by stealth" - could be a mistake.

The report indicates areas in the gun are most likely those with small populations, limited revenues, ageing infrastructure and high levels of debt as well as those which could struggle if if a natural disaster struck.

"Vulnerable" councils are not named outright, but at the back of the report is a chart of every council's statistics. Tiny rural councils with populations under 10,000 and high public debt include Buller and Westland on the South Island's West Coast, which both abut the bigger town of Greymouth.

In the King Country, neighbouring Waitomo and Otorohanga district councils have relatively high public debt.

South Wairarapa and Carterton have already been involved in discussions with the town of Masterton to the north, as they seek to avert any danger of being sucked into a Wellington supercity.

The report says the Auckland council reforms have prompted "calls for amalgamations of local authorities elsewhere".

Carterton mayor Ron Mark says small-town mayors fear the Government has a "game plan" to roll out amalgamations after the election. He claims one "cavalier" minister had boasted this "will just be done" to several mayors.

"I do not think there's any mayor in the greater Wellington area who does not see the significance of what happened in Auckland and the threat that poses to other territorial authorities," said Mark.

"The fear is rural provincial New Zealand will be totally subsumed by urban and suburban New Zealand."

Rodney Hide said the comprehensive review would investigate such fundamental nuts and bolts as "should there be councils as we know it?"

Any talk of possible amalgamations was a long way off, he said, as the Government had promised there would be no more before the election. "There is a general misunderstanding that this review is trying to emulate what happened in Auckland across New Zealand. This is not true."