John MacDonald: The alternative to ditching regional councils

You know how at work you can get people leaving and, instead of hiring new people, they just dish out the work to other people.

Then it gets to the point where the other people look up and realise they’re overworked, overloaded, and burnt out.

I wonder if that’s how mayors around the country are feeling about the prospect of them not only running their own councils but taking over their local regional council, as well.

That’s what the Government is proposing, with the ultimate aim of pretty much getting rid of regional councils as we know them.

Which I think is the wrong way of going about it. I think the Government should instead be focussing on all the other councils we’ve got. We have 67 local authorities in New Zealand. So work on having less city and district councils because that’s where the genuine overlap and duplication happens.

But the Government sees this as an easier sell. I know that from hearing Local Government Minister Chris Bishop say that people have got no idea what regional councils do, so let’s get rid of them.

I think it would be very easy for me to fall into the trap of cheering the Government on on this front because —trust me— I’m in no doubt that we have too many local councils. But I’m not cheering on this proposal because, in the long run, I don’t think it’s going to mean much.

If it was me telling the Government what should happen, I’d be saying unitary authorities are the way to go, which are basically councils that are regional councils and city or district councils all rolled into one.

Because why does somewhere the size of Timaru, for example, have two councils? The district council and the regional council. It shouldn’t.

That’s why I think the Government is all a bit backside-about-face on this one and should be focussing on us having less of the smaller councils and keeping the regional councils.

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