1. Rosemary Neave’s letter in Press this week:
I support four year terms. However the present proposal to have the option of central government extending for a year is madness.
Have they even considered the implications for local government?? I suspect not. If both local and central government move to four years all good.
To have it open ended could end up both elections happening in the same year. The review of LG recommended four year terms. Let’s move to that for both central and local government.
2. In the Press Luke Malpass Government moves to reward councils for more houses | The Post wrote:
The biggest problem for local government is shown in a simple chart produced by the Productivity Commission in 2019. It is the share of government as part of the economy; taxation as a share of gross domestic product (GDP), going back to 1895. Back then, local government taxation was 2% of the economy, while central government taxation was about 7%.
Today, core Crown tax revenue as a share of GDP has rocketed up to about 29% (the fiscal deficit making it look better than it is), while local government’s has remained – over more than 130 years – at about 2%.
the basic problem facing local government. Especially in an era of climate change, when it will fall to local authorities to plan and build for land use changes, more frequent flooding and the like. Local councils bear the brunt.
The still-low level of funding – combined with the democratic impulse, not limited to local government, to let the next people in power pay for necessary things that don’t win many votes – has meant that councils have basically been left holding the bag. Plus central government has pushed a lot of regulatory cost downwards.
Are there nonsense things some councils spend money on, or mixed up priorities? Sure. But the same could be said of central government, and it depends on your point of view.
The fact remains that councils have a more immediate effect on most people’s lives than central government does. They provide the water, roads, collect the rubbish, run the libraries, pools, do all the planning and resource consents, put on events in the local gardens, often run classes and events and much more besides.
Many councils now also find themselves subsidising or providing healthcare premises so they can attract doctors, jobseeker programmes and a bunch of other things central government either isn’t doing or is failing at.
They also bear the costs of the growth – new infrastructure, water, roads and everything else. In addition to the usual Nimby concerns that basically are consistent everywhere all of the time (“it was fine when my place was built, but I don’t like the new developments”), it does actually cost current ratepayers to welcome new ratepayers into the mix.
Even though government does not pay rates and imposes costs on Local Government with little, if any, consultation and charges a tax on a tax (GST on rates) there appears to be very little desire by either Labour or National to address this injustice. This leads to this sort of headline Napier council proposes two-year library closure to limit rates increase – NZ Herald.
As ratepayers rightly baulk at rate increases MP’s often join the criticism ignoring the fact that Local Government has remained 2% of GDP whilst Central Government tax share of GDP over the past 130 years has gone from 7% to 29%.
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