Amalgamation is back as the hottest topic in local government, this time with four voices in the local government space butting heads at the Southern Field Days.
"Where to next for councils?" was held last Thursday and featured Environment Southland chairman Jeremy McPhail, Southland Federated Farmers President Jason Herrick, Gore District Mayor Ben Bell and Thriving Southland Independent chairman Jeff Grant going back and forth relating to issues local government entities faced.
Words were not minced, as Mr Herrick made his position clear — rates and debt were skyrocketing, pensioners were struggling, and the system was not working.
"The definition of stupidity is carrying on, doing the same thing, and expecting results," he said.
Councils lived "on a different planet" and discussion between panelists became somewhat contentious at the idea of meetings and decisions being held behind closed doors.
Mr Herrick continually made his point in favour of amalgamation. However, he said he was not in favour of Southland’s proposal necessarily, but rather sought out more options for an eventual referendum.
His suggestion of a referendum where the bottom option is "whacked off" until eventually an option was picked was not popular with other panelists, Mr Bell laughing as he suggested he "would not touch it with a 10-foot pole".
All panelists were in agreement the process would have to make economic sense. Disagreement came over whether an amalgamated entity would reduce local representation locally, and also in central government.
Mr Grant said it was important to be cautious, asking how many people in Auckland or in the United Kingdom felt represented by their larger entities, but said it did not make sense to consult mayors on the process, comparing it to "asking turkeys to vote for Christmas".
Some concepts in local government were antiquated, Mr Grant said. He was in favour of shared services between councils, but against the complicated process of consenting and planning, citing a project which took "nine months to get the consent and six weeks to build".
Mr Grant said the role of Environment Southland was to deal with the environment in Southland, a very different job to other local government entities, and was important for future generations.
Mr McPhail said the question was asked so "let’s answer it and see what comes of it".
Mr Bell said there were conversations about economies of scale, doing things better, and working together to ensure entities were fiscally responsible, but he was unsure about the future.
However a lot of the conversation was, to "be brutally honest, all fluff" to Mr Bell, who said it came down to the bottom lines.
"If this isn’t financial, if the opportunity isn’t financial, there’s no point in doing this. If there isn’t an opportunity to reduce debt or stop rate increases, we might as well just box on as we are, because if we’re going to spend a lot of money amalgamating to no financial gain, there’s not really a point," he said.
