KEY POINTS:
There are many in local government scratching their heads after the appointment of Act leader Rodney Hide as Minister of Local Government and wondering what on earth they did to upset Prime Minister John Key so much.
Back in July when he addressed the Local Government New Zealand conference, Mr Key was at his smoochy best.
"We want to work closely with the local government sector... because on many issues, central and local government are in the same boat. We are both major players in the economy and in society. What we do actually matters in people's lives."
He went further, saying, "It's my view that central government has much to learn from local government when it comes to infrastructure planning, investment and management".
He held out great hope to his local partners that a National Government would find new ways for them to finance infrastructure development. "As the local government rates inquiry concluded, the current reliance on rates as the main funding tool for councils to maintain and develop infrastructure is simply not sustainable. It seriously limits the ability of councils to respond to their citizens' varying ability, and willingness, to pay."
He noted how over the past few years, local government had been given new obligations "in areas as diverse as gambling, prostitution and dog control" which "have not been adequately funded by the Government". Under National this would change.
He ended by talking of national and local government learning from each other, and how when he was Prime Minister "we will want to work through some important issues with you, honestly and openly".
However, the moment he's in a position to begin this love-in, what does he do but appoint as Minister of Local Government the leader of a party which is pledged to strip most of its functions over to private operators, confining councillors "to the core activities that produce public benefits, such as regulations, flood controls and roads".
Top of the scorched earth local government policy list Mr Hide was elected on was that "local government will be required to shed its commercial activity, thereby eliminating the need to separate regulatory and commercial functions between local and regional councils". Policy number two was that "roads and piped water will be supplied on a fully commercial basis".
Under the subhead "principles" we're told that "the bias against development held by many councils is stifling innovation and growth" and that "councils' capture by narrow interest groups (eg, anti-motorist groups) is unfair to all".
"Grandiose expenditure projects" are out. Except, it seems, when they're new roads.
The commercial activities in Mr Hide's faith-based policy that are to be shed by local government are not listed, but presumably they include bus and train services, water, roads, libraries, swimming pools and theatre complexes such as Auckland's The Edge, and Wellington's Michael Fowler complex. And then there are the port companies and airports and the like.
Of course, unless Mr Key really is the smiling assassin of Labour's worst nightmares, and Mr Hide is his carefully planned Trojan Horse, then Act's local government reform wish-list is not going to happen. Act doesn't have the numbers.
Still, if Mr Key really believes his purple prose about how vital the partnership between local and national government is, then what possessed him to select as his ambassador to the other half of the partnership someone elected on a policy of wrecking local government as we know it?
Mr Hide's ability to twist and turn his principles to the prevailing political winds are legendary. I'm still grateful for him helping save the Auckland Regional Amenities Funding Act by voting in support of a crucial stage in its passage through Parliament.
This is the bill which introduced region-wide funding for a cross-section of arts and community organisations against the vociferous opposition of the smaller councils. Yet I don't see how he squares this support with Act's policy, which speaks out against "special interest groups [that] get money for programmes yet everyone ends up paying for them".
However pragmatic Mr Hide has proven himself to be, it's still asking a lot of local body officials and politicians to have to work with someone purporting to represent National Government policy, who is all along itching to find ways of dismembering the whole edifice and distributing the parts to his private enterprise mates.
What Mr Key needs to spell out clearly, publicly and to Mr Hide, is what exactly is the local government policy of the National-Act-Maori Government. Is it the respectful partnership he spoke so glowingly of back in July?
Did he mean what he said when he promised to relieve the rates burden by giving local government "a broader range of [funding] tools that can be used to address the needs of local communities". We also need Mr Key to have Mr Hide stand up and say which policy he is ministering.
