Councillor Trevor Maxwell and mayor Tania Tapsell butted heads during a Rotorua District Council meeting on Friday.
A district councillor invoked Chinese President Xi Jinping and the late Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe in a discussion about mayor Tania Tapsell’s decisions at an at-times fiery Rotorua Lakes Council meeting on Thursday.
The councillor, Trevor Maxwell, also said he believed it was “mean-spirited” elected members had to pay for their own Christmas dinner on Thursday evening.
The meeting included an agenda item to establish council committees and who was to lead them.
Tapsell said a new structure would be put in place - an “infrastructure and environment” committee and a “community and development” committee.
She would chair the former and deputy mayor Sandra Kai Fong would chair the latter, with two deputies appointed for each - Fisher Wang and Karen Barker, and Gregg Brown and Rawiri Waru respectively, with the intention of allowing deputy chairs to be trained to take on the main role, with a review of the structure and roles “within one year”.
In the meeting, Maxwell - first elected 45 years ago - said the mayor and deputy mayor had never held their positions while also being chairs of committees.
“For me, wow, President Xi Jinping of China ... and late Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe would be very proud of those self-appointed positions that you’ve put in place.”
Maxwell said: “Well, what’s your point of order please, I’ll time it.”
Rotorua councillor Trevor Maxwell. Photo / Andrew Warner
Tapsell said Maxwell was being “quite disrespectful”. She asked if he was “quite all right” and Maxwell asked if he could continue speaking. Tapsell said he could “carry on respectfully”.
Maxwell said: “With respect, local government leadership should be about teamwork and sharing the workload of council.
“We should be growing the learning of governance, skills, not limiting any opportunities.”
He said he was “offended” Māori ward members were not offered more than one deputy chair role.
“This feels like crumbs from the colonial table.”
Tapsell called another point of order - “Councillor Maxwell, please.”
Maxwell said it was his “personal feeling”. Tapsell said he could continue “respectfully, without making any insults”.
Maxwell said he also took offence he had not been asked to take any leadership role.
“I’m currently the chair of two national boards and the most experienced councillor to have come through the last election.
“He mea taka, he mea takahi tenei i taku mana, he patu wairua, ma te atua koutou e manaaki.”
Roughly translated, that meant he felt, in his view, his mana and spirit had been trampled on.
Tapsell said she acknowledged Maxwell’s personal opinions and, as she said so, he raised his open-palmed hand and, without turning his microphone on, appeared to say, “speak to the hand”.
Tapsell said: “But they are - speak to the hand, do you reckon? Councillor Maxwell, I am quite concerned about you, if you do need a break then we shall take it, but this is certainly not the behaviour that myself as mayor or our community would expect from an elected member and a leader of this community.”
She said elected members required “a level of integrity” and respect.
Maxwell continued to interject as Tapsell spoke, and when he appeared to raise his voice, Tapsell said: “Councillor Maxwell, I ask you to please contain yourself or I must ask you to leave ... I am the mayor, Councillor Maxwell, I call order to this meeting.
Rotorua mayor Tania Tapsell. Photo / Ben Fraser
“I have given reason about why myself and the deputy mayor will be leading the new committee structure. You have said never have we had that before. But never have we had 70 per cent of this council table as new elected members.”
She said she acknowledged Maxwell’s long service to the community.
“I have often praised you, even recently, for being the longest-serving member of the Rotorua council, but also in the country. Nothing takes that mana and that service away from you, and it [has] certainly never been my intention.
“What my clear intention is with these appointments is to ensure that our new, elected members are able to be the best-performing leaders possible, which is why I have - and it is different - appointed two co-chairs to deputy chair. Normally, this would only be one appointment.
“I do apologise for any personal offence that was taken in not giving you a chair or deputy chair role, it was certainly not my intention.”
The motion was put to adopt the committees and their appointments, with all in favour except Maxwell, who voted against.
Earlier in the meeting, Maxwell had also said he believed it was “a little mean-spirited” councillors and their partners had to pay for their own Christmas dinner at an event scheduled for that evening.
“Who made that call? I’m disappointed about that.”
Tapsell said a council priority was “prudent financial management”.
“Since you asked that, I’ll answer it. Yes, we are paying for our own Christmas dinner because we are that sound and responsible.”
Maxwell asked if next year “we can bring our own cucumber sandwiches?”
Tapsell wished him a Merry Christmas back and she was looking forward to the dinner.
“I do look forward to our community not having to see that this council is spending money on things that they do not see as a priority.”
In the meeting, the council also unanimously agreed to allow members to join meetings by audio-visual link and to allow chairs of meetings the discretion of a casting vote on split decisions, and the council reported an operating deficit for the four months to October 31 of $1.2 million.
Council organisational enablement deputy chief executive Thomas Colle said the result could “appear a little bit confusing” as some capital revenue was tied to milestones for major projects. As some of those projects had not yet reached their milestones, revenue could not yet be drawn down.
“Hence why there is such a large variance in the financial report.
