Address to Northshore Grey Power AGM

Good afternoon. It's good to be addressing another Grey Power meeting where I'm seeing people like you who look younger than me and have even more energy.

I’m very pleased to be Minister of Local Government and I’m really enjoying the challenge. I’m certainly having fun!

While it would have been great to be Minister of Finance, ACT didn’t get quite enough votes for that.

My first goal in negotiating with the Prime Minister was to get as many of the policies that we campaigned on into the confidence and supply agreement so we could deliver on what we promised.

My other objective was to be selected for the role of Minister of Local Government because I think that local government has been out of control for many years, and it’s an area where I knew I could make a real difference for people like yourselves.

As public officials I think we must always remember that every dollar we spend belongs to someone else. And when you’re spending other people’s hard-earned money, you should do so very carefully.

When you’re spending other people’s money you have to be doubly vigilant, and there hasn’t been much of that in central government or local government for many, many years.

It’s my job to ensure that we all get better value for our money and that we get our rates under control. So this is what I’ve been trying to do.

Firstly let me talk about Auckland, because I know we’ve all got an interest in that. We had the Royal Commission report and the Government made a number of decisions as a consequence of that, which we have been very busily working on.

I’m not someone who believes that bigger is necessarily better, but I believe simple is certainly best.

I never understood why it took so many politicians to run Auckland, and why it needed seven mayors and a chairman.

And why they just spent most of their time arguing and bickering and writing reports about why the other one was wrong and why they were right.

It seemed to me that as Auckland is one region, the simple solution is to have one council, one Mayor, and one plan. And that’s what the Government is recommending.

I was very concerned though to ensure strong local representation, because it seemed to me that a risk of having one big council was that it could get distanced from the people.

It could also lack the diversity that you expect to see in any community.

So we pushed for local boards to have some real power and some real say, and to reflect the different communities in greater Auckland.

That in itself doesn’t ensure that rates are under control or we get better for money. I think what it can do though is ensure a better and simpler governance structure.

In tandem with the reform of Auckland governance, I have work underway to make the Local Government Act a lot friendlier to ratepayers.

I regard myself as the Minister for Ratepayers, rather than the Minister of Local Government, because it is you the rate payers who are paying for everything.

In going around the country meeting with councillors, I have been astonished at the extent to which they say their cost increases have been a consequence of central government decision making.

First of all, I’m looking at with things like mandatory water and air quality standards, mandatory consultation and planning procedures, and excessive water requirements.

I’m going through with a big sharp pencil crossing out as many of those things as I can, because at the end of the day someone has to pay for all that and that someone is you and the people your organisation represents. I believe that’s wrong.

I don’t believe we need to lose services, but I believe very strongly that we can get much better value for money.

I’m also concerned that local councils tend to run out of control, having less accountability to ratepayers than we in central government have to voters - as astonishing as that may seem.

So I’m also working with officials on amendments to the Local Government Act to provide the sort of accountability and transparency that should be expected.

I believe that it is important for rate payers to be able to see what their councils are costing them, and whether their mayors and councillors are delivering on their promises. I don’t think that happens now.
I’m also a big fan of councils getting their rates under control.

I get a lot of push back from mayors and councillors, who simply think that if you don’t like them increasing rates you can vote them out.

But we all know that if you vote them out, the next lot can come in and put the rates up again.

I’m particularly interested in any mechanism we can find to both control rates and target council costs, because my fear is that if we control the rates over here, they will end up putting charges up over there, and increasing their expenditure in other ways.

I think that any one who stands for public office should have to make the case for any increase in expenditure, and indeed the expenditure they have got now - to justify it to you. I believe it’s your money, not theirs.

I also believe the tax payers money that I’m responsible for is your money, not mine, and I am only spending it on your behalf.

So if you can’t see how it’s being spent, or justify how its being spent, than what possible right do I have to spend it.

As I travel around the country a lot of people are asking me if the new Auckland governance structure is going to be a model for the rest of the country. It could be.

It depends on how well it goes for Auckland, and how well we go in implementing it.

If it works well, then other areas may want to build something for themselves on the basis of what we’re creating for Auckland.

I have worked hard at developing proposals for Auckland that could be replicated around the country.

What the Royal Commission originally proposed for Auckland was unique and could only be applied to Auckland. I didn’t think that was a particularly good model.

In the structure we have proposed, we have tried to break the parochialism that has dogged good governance in Auckland.

That’s been a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding about the Auckland proposals, and a lot of people getting upset unnecessarily.

An example is the often repeated claim by Labour that some how I will be selling off Auckland’s assets.

I can assure you that my mother would never let me touch a single library, in Auckland or anywhere else in New Zealand. And I’m more scared of my mother than any number of Auckland mayors who may be mustered against me.

I’m also conscious of the careful approach to money that people of my parents’ generation have – every dollar needs to be carefully accounted for.

I think that’s the approach to spending we should see in our councils and in central Government, and it appals me that we don’t.

Thank you again for the invitation to join you here today. I've very happy to hear any comments you have, or to answer any questions.