Local Government is in crisis. The numbers tell the story: local authority rates increased 12.2 percent in the 12 months to the March 2025 quarter – a 14 percent contribution to the 2.5 percent annual increase in inflation. As a result of the reckless spending of local authorities, interest rates are staying higher for longer, with all New Zealanders paying the price.
So why have local authorities gone off the rails?
To answer that question, we need to cast our mind back to the reforms introduced by Helen Clark’s Labour Government. Under the guise of enabling local authorities ‘to better serve their communities’, the Local Government Act 1974, which had kept councils focussed on delivering essential services and maintaining infrastructure, was replaced by the all-empowering Local Government Act 2002.
This transformed local authorities from prioritising the basics, to becoming all things to all people with a resulting blow-out in costs.
Three changes in particular unleashed a cascade of unintended negative consequences.
The first was the introduction of a new ‘purpose’ clause in Section 3 that released local government from its prescriptive constraints by requiring councils “to promote the social, economic, cultural and environmental wellbeing of communities.”
The second, in Section 12, released councils from their funding constraints by giving them the powers of general competence.
And the third change replaced colourblind legislation with provisions to privilege Maori through the inclusion of special Treaty rights, along with the option of establishing Maori wards.
The passing of the new law revolutionised local government. Recognising the opportunity provided by the well-beings and the power of general competence to gain influence over local councils and ratepayer funding to advance their causes, vested interest groups began challenging for elected positions.
As ideologically driven radicals gained a controlling influence within councils, a literal Pandoras Box of questionable and ‘nice-to-have’ schemes emerged: state-of-the-art event centres (Christchurch’s Stadium which began as a $30 million project has now escalated to $683 million); lavish council offices (Tauranga’s $125 million new office fit-out included $470,000 for coffee machines); over-the-top facilities (Wellington spent $2.3 million on a toilet block!); dubious ‘investments’ (New Plymouth spent $260 million buying farms in Australia); and expensive overseas junkets (Wellington spent $50,000 sending the Mayor and four staff to Asia) – while essential infrastructure and services were neglected.
For Maori, the new legislation opened up a galaxy of opportunities to gain influence over councils – and create lucrative income streams. This was not only as a result of the potential establishment of Maori seats, but through tribal advisory groups – some with full voting rights.
A wide variety of planning and “partnership” agreements began to emerge between Councils and local tribal groups, resulting in a multitude of ‘sweetheart’ deals – to the detriment of ratepayers and the wider community.
In many parts of the country, tribal leaders have attempted to go further and force local authorities to take on the role of ‘Treaty partner’ with the same duties and obligations as the Crown.
That is despite councils not being Treaty partners – as was confirmed by a recent High Court case, Hart v Marlborough District Council [2025] NZHC 47, where the Judge said, “Local authorities are not directly subject to the Treaty of Waitangi and its principles as they are not part of the Crown and thus not party to the Treaty.”
This means councils have no Treaty obligations at common law, beyond those stated in their empowering legislation.
Once Labour’s 2002 law was in place, as a result of the strong Maori influence, councils began attempting to establish Maori Wards – without first seeking a mandate from their local communities.
Fortunately, a safeguard had been included in the legislation by Helen Clark’s Government. Because creating Maori wards modifies the voting system through the introduction of the Maori electoral roll, it represents a major constitutional change. As a result, electors were given the right to petition their council and force a binding referendum – to ensure that any decisions were being made in the best interest of communities, and not in the best interest of the councillors themselves.
Between 2002 and 2020, petition rights were used to challenge council attempts to establish Maori wards on twenty-four occasions. Almost without exception, New Zealanders up and down the country opposed dividing their communities by race, with the result, that only one poll succeeded – Wairoa in 2018.
New Zealanders did not want race-based seats and nor did they buy into the argument that they were needed to give Maori a voice around the decision-making table. In fact Local Government New Zealand confirmed that in a survey in 2019, which revealed that 13.5 percent of elected Councillors were Maori – the same as the 13.7 percent of Maori in the adult population.
Despite there being no underrepresentation of Maori in local government, in 2021, the Ardern-Labour Government, without any warning or consultation, introduced retrospective legislation under urgency to abolish local government petition rights, justifying their move by claiming Maori were under-represented.
Their tapestry of lies was designed to disguise their true motivation, which was to advance their He Puapua plan for tribal rule by 2040 – a key part of which was the tribal takeover of local government.
Once petition rights were removed, powerful tribal lobby groups moved in and pressured local authorities around the country to introduce Maori wards. As a result, there was an explosion in numbers: 32 were established, leading to Maori representation on councils escalating to 21.6 percent in 2022, with Maori now significantly over-represented in local government – just as they are in central government.
Once elected in 2023, the new Coalition Government swiftly changed the law to restore petition rights, requiring all councils that had established Maori wards or had planned to do so without consulting their community to either scrap them or hold a binding referendum at the 2025 election.
As a result, forty-two councils around New Zealand will be running a referendum on the future of the Maori wards in October’s local body elections. If communities vote against them, the seats will be abolished from 2028.
The battle for the Maori seats is expected to become intense. Literally hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions, are being syphoned off most council balance sheets for projects that enrich Maori – at a cost to all other residents and ratepayers. Tribal leaders will fight hard to retain their influence.
How voters around the country vote in the referendums remains to be seen, but in the Thames-Coromandel area a recent survey of 500 residents carried out for Coromandel FM indicates that locals still prefer their communities to be united – not divided by race – with 76 percent either against or unsure about retaining the Maori ward (48 percent were against, 28 percent undecided and 24 percent in favour).
The October referenda are extremely important in the fight against racial privilege in New Zealand. Unwinding the Maori seats on local councils will send a very strong signal to our politicians – local and central – that Kiwis are fundamentally opposed to division by race.
The local body election will also provide an opportunity to identify and remove those councillors who voted in favour of Maori wards without seeking a mandate from their community. They need to be reminded that it is electors who should have the final say on how representatives are elected, not councillors.
With the on-going Manurewa Marae voting scandal in mind, and anecdotal evidence from the last local body elections that ballot papers were “harvested”, concerns are now being raised about the serious potential for widespread voter fraud and corruption that is inherent in the local authority postal voting system.
The Coalition needs to urgently advise what safeguards they intend putting in place to prevent the illegal manipulation of the referendum and the election.
Meanwhile, the Coalition has announced a raft of changes to undo the damage done by the Clark and Ardern governments: “The local government reform programme will remove references to the ‘four well-beings’ from the Local Government Act 2002, refocus local government on basics, avoid duplication of roles with central Government, and benchmark council performance.”
They want councils to focus back onto roads, rubbish, and reliable infrastructure.
And to help ratepayers assess the competence of their councils and hold them to account, annual reports on comparative performance will be published that will include such things as debt, capital expenditure, whether the budget is balanced, and the condition of roads.
Other measures that are also being considered to improve local government performance include the introduction of a New South Wales-style rates peg to prevent rate blowouts, along with mechanisms in the new Resource Management Act replacement to stop councils stalling on housing development, and to reduce the power of the local government planning bureaucracy, which ‘has tied New Zealand up in knots’.
Meanwhile the Minister for Regional Development Shane Jones is questioning the need for Regional Councils altogether, claiming they are not only “hobbling” economic progress, but that the overbearing influence of iwi and ‘the creeping scope of co-governance initiatives that have extended well beyond the initial intent’, have led to a deep concern that councils are “turning into some sort of iwi back office”.
ACT’s Local Government spokesperson Cameron Luxton is also concerned about the tribal takeover and would like to see a stronger emphasis on democracy in the reforms: “The moves by some councils to give unelected appointees voting rights on committees, or to create Maori wards with disproportionate voting power, are unacceptable.”
These concerns are echoed by this week’s NZCPR Guest Commentator, Bay of Plenty Regional Councillor Ken Shirley, a former ACT Member of Parliament and Labour Minister:
“Over recent decades the concept of Iwi partnership morphed into co-governance, which now in some people’s view, is morphing into dual or separate but parallel sovereignty. Councils are immersed in this impasse and cannot escape the challenge. Councils are both the meat and the mustard in the impasse sandwich. Sometimes reluctantly and unwittingly, but often willingly, it is councils and council staff, together with some central government departments who are driving the co-governance and separate sovereignty agendas.
“Government has signalled that references to treaty principles is to be removed from some 26 pieces of legislation, including the Local Government Act and RMA derivatives. It also seems likely that the statutory requirement for cultural impact assessments for all resource consents, irrespective of relevancy, will be truncated.
“At a national level Te Pati Maori, the Green Party and elements of the New Zealand Labour Party, are actively promoting co-sovereignty. Conversely the coalition partners of the current government firmly reject co-sovereignty, are actively winding back on co-governance with most also questioning the concept of partnership introduced by the judiciary in 1987.”
While the inefficiencies and cost blowouts of local government are a major concern for the Coalition – and rightly so given the huge impact it has on our economy and our lives – they must not lose sight of the fact that many parts of the country local government is now effectively being run by iwi for their own benefit.
And if the Coalition wants an example, they need look no further than the Northland Regional Council, where two Maori seat councillors, along with three ‘green’ councillors hold the balance of power on a council of nine. Backed by a permanent Maori Advisory Group of 21 members, along with pressure from the Northland Iwi Leaders Forum, the Council has adopted “Vision 2040”, which is a local government equivalent to He Puapua. In effect, the council is being run to advance a pro-Maori agenda, and millions of dollars are now being diverted into projects for the sole benefit of Maori.
The Coalition cannot ignore this state of affairs. They not only need to include in their reforms legislative provisions to remove advisory groups from councils, but they actually need to get on with the job. Dragging their feet over local government reform is unacceptable!
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THIS WEEK’S POLL ASKS:
*How would you rate the performance of your local authorities – good, average, or poor?
*Poll comments are posted below.
*All NZCPR poll results can be seen in the Archive.
THIS WEEK’S POLL COMMENTS
| Selwyn Council is dishonest and Co-governance fixated two unelected Nga Tahu members with voting rights.All of our Community buildings have made up Maori names.Council ignored 86% of ratepayers against a separate water entity which will be 50% tribal control | Les |
| My local council is top drawer. Really delivering for our community. We embraced Maori wards. | Mary |
| Too much emphasis on “Tamaki Makarau” | Warren |
| The quality of the Mayors and Councilors generally are below par because most are only there to service their own interests. | Noel |
| Spending they haven’t got and costing the rate payer more and more every year. Its about time the rates were capped and all the nice to haves stopped until the councils can afford them | Alan |
| The International crime gang, that masquerade as our elected leaders, have been hard at work, forever trying to destroy our hard earned DEMOCRACY…they are ALL working harder than ever, because they know that time is short, and it is! That makes US, have to do the same…. so that we don’t let the career criminals have their way again, trying ti steal our FREEDOM AND DEMOCRACY, iT CAN ONLY BE DONE THRU UNITING TOGETHER TO STOP THESE DEMONS, ONCE AND FOR ALL!! LETS DO IT, THIS TIME! | david |
| enormous spending on lavish unnecessary projects for a feel good result while ignoring essential spending on capital development projects to protect the public from damaging weather events which could result in public lives lost is not the work of a responsible local body. They need overhauling to refocus on humanity protection issues | terrence |
| 20% rates increase, Living wage for all Council employees, Contracts only to employers who pay all their staff the Living Wage. Cycle lanes everywhere | leslie |
| Another example of a bureaucratic cost plus system | David |
| The maorification is everywhere only because the local authorities are sadly lacking in gumption and don’t stand up to these ignorant partbreds, and activist judges are allowing it. | Dianne |
| On track for Agenda 2030, ‘You will own nothing and be happy’. | Robert |
| They are openly hostile and allowing gvt to let unelected iwi To run our country for their own benefit . This is anachronism!. | Dianne |
| High rates for little benefit – get back to basics | tony |
| Back to the basics | bRuCe |
| Dunedin City Council and ORC. | Murray |
| No way you could buy services provided by council privately for the cost of rates amazingly efficient organizations | John |
| They spend too much on excessive projects | Peter |
| We do not have Maori wards and have not been threatened with them yet. Belong to LGNZ still which I do not agree with. | Monica |
| Re Timaru District Council. Re ECAN – average. | Malcolm |
| once my local council put in maori wards without asking it was a slippery road to overspending, backhanders, incompetence and getting worse every year, our roads a patched then the slightest rain we have slips tar seal lifting and culverts blocked and road washouts, one member leaves goes into parliament and still claims both salarys, if thats not greed I dont know what is he had to give up the council salary but shows how corruption has got into govt local as well as main , I welcome Oct so I can get rid of the hori seats and maybe some of the dead heads in my local council. | Richard |
| typically, more interested in virtue signals than actual useful infrastructure projects and maintenance. | miks |
| Too much Iwi influence and control.It is He PuaPua full steam ahead. There is no place for race based policies or treaty cenrtic nonsense in local government or in central government | gale |
| We have two unelected mana whenua on our council who have voting rights on committees and a voice but no vote on our main council meeting,the public did not get a referendum to decide if they wanted this | Karen |
| Napier Council run by an accountant and is effed | Wayne |
| Councils have lost their way. Three year cycles are too short, likewise accountability. | Peter K |
| Regarding my area, the council has done some good work and has done poorly on other works. The good works are to do with the assistance to local sports and recreation activities. The poor side is to do with the lack of real improvements to our local infrastructure, fixing our flood control and over spending on matters relating to the so called TOW principles when such matters are supposed to be between the central Government and our local tribes, due to councils not being signatories to the TOW document. Therefore I have to say that they are average overall. Good at some things and poor performers on other things. | Garry. |
| Incompetent and out of touch with ratepayers. | susan |
| All Councils need to be forced to scrap any pro Maori agenda & get back to their core functions of providing for all constituents. | david |
| The Taupo District Council seems to represent what is happening with local councils all over NZ. They literally waste millions of dollars on totally unnecessary rubbish, the latest effort being 100k on a stainless steel dinosaur statue, and so proud of it they are that it has even been given a name ” Boom Boom”. Meanwhile the sewage treatment plant urgently needs to be updated and expanded as it is at capacity. They also see fit to change the zoning of land and allow development that only enriches developers and leaves the ratepayers with huge infrastructure costs to serve these developments. The entire system in NZ smacks no stinks of corruption and back door dealings and as a result democracy is dead in NZ. | John |
| Vasnity projects, blowout of bureaucrats, job inefficiencies | Tony |
| To many unelected people sitting on their bottoms been over paid for nothing. | Sven |
| Poor roads, footpaths. High cost of rates elected councillors, Not enough Parking. Need to get back to basic necessities. Get rid of Maori Wards, just an unelected racist travesty. Need this Govt to Do what you voted in for! Save NZ from all this Radical Rubbish! | Audrey |
| Very very very poor! | Trevor |
| Treasonous is the correct word. Selling our country to corpoarte cabals who want to own everything and we will have nothing. You wont be very happy. | Alan |
| And to top off poor performance our mayor Proudly stated he and the TCDC have unanimously voted to have Maori wards. No consultation with the rate payers of course. | Heather |
| Abysmal -Tasman District Council needs to be scrapped and started again with the clear understanding of who they serve and why. | Glenda |
| Kaipara | Kathleen |
| We do have changes from auckland council,.Wayne brown is doing his best under the circumstances. | John |
| too much maori and woke being forced into our face’s and local Gov. | rod |
| Poor – mostly due to embracing too much Maori B-S. | Scott |
| Currently average but should over representation by Maori occur the perf0rmance will drop by at least 50% thereby rendering the council redundant | Clive |
| We have an ineffective Mayor without a backbone. Has delayed community improvements of local swimming pool upgrade for safety, to instead arrange for sculptures to be created depicting unknown Maori symbols installed at various locations in the Western BOP. | John |
| They are investing too much into staffing, and consultants and also in buying land along with Iwi for housing development while pumping up rates! | Gaye |
| Wayne Brown is doing his best to curb the out of control spending of Council but can’t do it alone. Apathetic (or is that pathetic) Aucklanders who can’t be bothered voting need to take some responsibility. Councils should get back to their core responsibilities, reduce staff numbers and address the needs of the region not the wants of individuals. | Bruce |
| Excessive rates increases (Continuing for years ahead) while the Major and Councillors still think it’s OK to go on junkets overseas. | Jay |
| All of the parties, that represent Green, Labour, and T.P.M on the local W.C.C, all of these, work ‘IN TANDEM’ with Central government, of the same colour.This means as well, that Council politicians all follow the Dictat, from W.E.F/UN/WHO, and AGENDA 21/50, in fact Politicians at the council level, have more contact with the U.N, THAN CENTRAL GOVT! Proof of this, where we see Andrew LIttle, making comeback, (He is a career politician) standing for Mayor… remember him? during COVID YEARS? Kiwi voters, will have to think very carefully, in October whom they are going to vote for… MAKE THE RIGHT CHOICE…. | david |
| There should be no racial divide in councils. Enough. | Carole |
| Disgraceful virtue signalling projects and agendas, that Ratepayers dont want nor require. CCC suck | Mark |
| Get rid of Maori wards and any co governance | leo |
| VERY VERY POOR | SHERYL |
| Actually I would have ticked ‘extremely poor’ if I had the option. Pro-Maori at the ratepayers’ expense. Rundown services. Rundown roads. Unwanted and un-necessary marae (millions for this). Money wasted on unwanted feel-good/vanity projects. I would accuse them of fraud and/or corruption. | Gerard |
| They are not listening to their communities and ratepayers. Our Council needs to refocus on the needs not wants and all Councils should stop their Rate hikes in this economic downturn. | June |
| council captured by one race, the rest of us are irrelevant. Maoification driving up costs, example, excessive unreadable signage in public places such as libraries that are now uncomfortable places to be. Rates we can longer afford to pay. Councils are no longer democratic or fit for purpose, it’s all about a treaty no one alive today signed. | Sam |
| Selwyn council is overly pro Maori and wastes the money that we pay in their ever increasing lust for more of our hard earned dollars | Peter |
| rates for one out of control | Ian |
| Rotorua has been saturated with Homeless people from all around NZ. Sent here with consent from our local council and local Iwi. Council also have made some sort of pact with the local Maori Iwi called the Fenton pact. | Wayne |
| The local authorities should go back to doing what they were voted in for and that is delivering essential services and maintaining infrastructure and stop speeding money they don’t have like buying farms overseas, trips overseas, and flash offices, etc, etc. And stop being driven by I.W.I. also known as the ( I WANT IT TRIBE) and let the voters decide who gets in and not the council. | COLIN |
| within Auckland City Council there is deep division and accordingly no progress on important matters is made. There must be a better method of governing | Frank |
| Nelson City Council is working well in relation to giving a lead to developing ideas to encourage the public to spend more time in the City, for shopping, entertainment and recreation. Shoppers have shown a large decline in visiting City shops resulting in a large number of empty premises which creates a bad impression. Naturally Richmond, with its great Mall, free parking and lively atmosphere attracts many more visits. The non elected Maori Wards on the Council are a down side and should never have been allowed as they give a disproprtionate weight to deliberations. | CHRIS |
| The W.C.C has to raise its game…Wellington does not compete as an International Capital city…Wellington used to be a vibrant capital city, a long time ago, well over 45 years or so…! Wellington used to be a “buzzing capital city” it was the centre of everything, in N.Z. Wellington has a beautiful harbour, everything,revolved around the harbour, Trade, transport, travel, with a busy shipping industry, ships were always “In Port”, the whole of the heart of the capital revolved around the busy port. One day, all of this ended…? The capital changed, and it has remained that way, the character of the capital disappeared.The capital is no longer a capital, it has become a joining junction transport place only, for the connection of the 2 Islands. The fact that Wellington has the seat of government, mainly as the centre for Head Offices, one may think, that this would make a world of difference, but it does not….It may be time for the W.C.C. to conduct a a’peoples think tank’, the main aspect being…How do we return Wellington to its CAPITAL STATUS…? | david |
| Local Govt throughout NZ can no longer be viewed as Democratic institutions. Thay have been high jacked by non-elected ideological and woke bureaucrats | Tony |
| Wastrels – | Phil |
| all gutless -followers of of maori opion and protacole, rather that stand up and be counted when it comes to crown rights. | bruce |
| Too much race based funding going on unchecked!!!! | Brian |
| We have gone from debt-free to millions in debt, since 2021. Most is for water projects brought forward (which was unnecessary) and building an Event Centre – which they are funding to the tune of $15m (borrowed $). | Janette |
| Local government is having to pick up more responsibility pushed on to it by central government. Further, some councils are now having to spend more because earlier administrations cut maintenance. Thus, the current councils are now facing tough issues. | Gavin |
| What we rates payers are paying and what we are getting is a lot of money wastage. Core services and solid maintainance is what we need , not CEO’s salaries and prestige projects. We are in dire need of people who are sober technocrats and financially prudent. | Michael |
| Over staffed Ignoring basic functions such as water sewage upgrades Vanity projects | Geoff |
| Spiralling rates, neglected core services,expensive vanity projects and unserviceable debt are the most pressing problems created by the Dunedin City Council silliness | Russel |
| It’s time for this Government to start listening to the silent majority on this issue or I’m convinced thery will be thrown out at the next election and then we’ll end up with chaos. | Ian |
| Our council wants to retain the maori wards. well I am sure as well as a lot of other people do not want them. Go, campaign and run for the council like every other ratepayer. If your campaign is well researched with communication that resonates to the voters you will get in, no need to run maori wards. collectively with research, discussion and debate our council can do the infrastructure, Rubbish etc it was meant to which is was my rates should be paying for. | Jackie |
| They’re employing too many people, unfocussed spending much of it having no long-term benefit, with communications littered with Maori words making them virtually unintelligible to most readers, Appalling. | Graham |
| Hope it improves now that the Council has full control of key CCO’s | Martin |
| Overspending on nice to haves, without any accountability or consequence to the community | Raymond |
| The local council in Wellington, have a Poor rating. They have not paid attention to the sad state that Wellingtons rating, has become. The Entertainment in Wellington , is ‘The Pits’.International Acts, give Wellington A BIG MISS, many won’t come here because of the venues, and Wellington is hardly an International Capital city, and does not rate at all….Lots of work needs to be done, to raise Wellington , to be a Capital city! Voters have to raise the standard, of councilors! vote the right people. | david |
| Our Local Govt the Dunedin District Council has been a huge disappointment. They have meddled in Government Politics by for instance coming out against David Seymour’s Bill with no mandate from the general Ratepayer!. They have likewise supported Maori names for local institutions with no mandate. The name Otepoti Dunedin was recently invented by them and a new Library at Mosgiel has an unpronounceable Maori name after no consultation with the local community. | Jerry |
| It seems to me they prefer to serve themselves rather than the rate payers whom they are meant to be representing ! | Stuart |
| They MUST do what we voted them IN to do, or BUGGER OFF | Mike |
| too many personal agendas for councelers | Geoffrey |
| It seems that future election candidates can simply be divided into two groups, “Anti Apartheit” and “Others”. I know two of the party’s I’ll be supporting but I’m really not sure which side of the fence the third one sits. | Allen |
| Grossly extravagant, unrepresentative (I believe) of the views of the majority of people and run by staff with their own agendas. | Steve |
| Very poor. Hastings and Napier, i have rates in both | Duncan |
| Far too much red tape from council now. It is difficult as a major business in Hawkes Bay to get through the planning process. | Phil |
| The rates continue to rocket. Only a minority of people want the green bin yet everyone has to pay the fee for it. I am totally against the trend towards the separation of Maori versus non Maori – we are ONE people of New Zealanders. They workforce should NOT be forced to learn Maori Tikunga, culture or anything else Maori. | Jan |
| In tough times, “needs”, “likes” and “wants” should be coded like “traffic Lights”. The “belts” should be tightend at governance level, rather then passed on to the average day worker (families). Get on to it and lead the people purposefully. | Henk |
| Can’t manage their way out of a paper bag. Dictated to by woke management and happy so long as they can have their vanity projects. They’ll be long gone when the wheels come off. | BrianDamage |
| Far too much Maori influence without any referendum. Why have we got the Te Arawa Board when we have a Council? | Sylvia |
| No control over expenditure and grossly inefficient. If they were run as a business, they would be bankrupt. | Paul |
| We’ve had an issue with a neighbour disregarding covenant rules and they have been absolutely useless | Sandra |
| The cost of every project is hyper inflated due to poor project governance- and everything is done for iwi or with an iwi/ treaty lens! All the councillors themselves are woke beyond belief and have no idea how their actions impact ratepayers – they’re all just taxpayer or ratepayer funded trough feeders. | Sacha |
| Auckland rates are affordable compared to other LA wellington is terrible and out of control We have too many local bodies | Barry |
| Not as bad as Wellington CC, but Porirua CC spends recklessly on non-essential assets and services… and on Maori demands. Not surprising because (like most local authorities) elected councillors are Green, Labour or Maori Party. | Peter |
| Waisting money on traffic calmers and roundabouts that don’t work | Brian |
| spend willy nilly on not u rgent things | Ian |
| We cannot stop the crazy speed humps, inlane bus stops and endless cycleways | Wayne |
| Nothing exceptional. | Ann |
| They have lost their way and are concentrating on nonsense stuff instead of fixing roads, water pipes and stormwater. Essential rates squandered on unnecessary projects, while essential services are neglected and fall into disrepair. | Don |
| Wellington is a disaster area thanks to a n extreme Left Council. | Trevor |
| Tauranga City Council must be the worst in the country and the govt minister should be doing something about the debt they are creating | Lyn |
| Too much waste! This government was meant to stop all this division and treaty nonsense. They will be voted out in next election if they don’t. | Chris |
| Loss of respect of their ratepayers, their customers. | Leonard |
| Go “woke go broke” has unfortunately been proven once again to be the absolute truth. The cabal of woke socialist morons, outrageously elected by the misinformed masses, have collectively and successfully set out to destroy everything they touch. Shame on all of them. | Richard |
| Councils have long held a separatist agenda where ordinary New Zealanders are ignored and then taxed into oblivion with no handbrakes in sight. It’s time to have a major change and get back to providing basic infrastructure requirements to rate payers. We’ve all had enough of paying through the nose forthe woke, divisive, and nice-to-have vanity projects! | Sheila |
| our local council has just voted to retain the controlof our water supply . | Peter |
| Not attending to the basics has finally come to a head. It would also be helpful to know more about candidates for local body elections. Who are they?? or are they just a smiling face on a brochure. It is too late to get to know them after the election. Engagement is poor by both the candidates and the voters for more than one reason and the results speak for themselves. | Gary |
| Auckland’s Council Very POOR INDEED _ T To “MUCH TALKEY and NO DOOIE” City looks a MESS Every WHERE INFORSTRUCTER PROBLEM’S TOTALY $$$$ OUT OF CONTROL | Bill Smythe |
| I live in Auckland. Wayne Brown is doing a good job. | Ian |
| Only just average—in many aspects, quite poor! | Robert |
| The state of the local council s in Aotearoa is poor.Thats, because the Govt has got no funds, the council in Wellington, just spent several million, on a flash NEON LIT toilet in the C.B.D, seems TORI’S greens don’t have any money? Water and pipes sewerage nees fixing , as well! | david |
| The Tron Council is G%uD83D%uDC40D… Against the national trend. | Graham |
| Too much money spent on “nice to have’s’ and no consideration regarding the financial implications on the ratepayers! For example. huge amounts of money spent on stupid statues of dinosaurs which have no correlation to the area that I live in. They existed in the past, but they existed everywhere in the past, certainly nothing relevant to our area in more recent times. | Heather |
| I beleive EVERYONE NEEDS TO EMAIL NZFIRST & NATIONAL GOVT> TO INTRODUCE LAWS TO PROTECT NZ FROM BECOMING A RACE BASED COUNTRY. | Cindy |
| Mr. Luxons idea of combining all local authorities stinks. One only has to look at the shambles Auckland City is in. | Denis |
| One look at the fountains in Wellington streets tells a a tragic story of inept management over the years, each council has their tragic story unfolding, but the most insidious part to it all is the council staff both elected and paid are in the maori pocket and progressing the puapua doctrine. It has to be scrapped, sack them at least and put in level thinking commissioners. | Neville |
| Grossly over paid executives- 50 years ago they got approximately the same salary as a senior bank manager, today they are probably double! | John |
| The legislation is too loose and allows for scope creep | Joh |
| Dreadful would describe it better. | Richard |
| overriding the majority opinions | anthony |
| Too many unnecessary and expensive projects. Must get back to basics. | Neville |
| I am in the Thames Coromandel area …. I need say no more! | Jan |
| Lot of variation in different areas. Basics should be the first consideration | Denis |
| Overspending on unnecessary things. Way too much on consultants, useless courses, and now quality control on work done. ( to name a few) | Yanna |
| Our council uses rate payers as a bottomless pit of money. We are a poor town but have one of the highest rates in NZ. | bevan |
| UHCC want 19.9% rates rise over next 3 years. Outragious. To pay for their 63 million dollar pool ? which We will never use. We need to vote out the maori wards gravey train and stop english names being turned into maori that are not understood by the majority of us or our overseas visitors. Why do we have to wait until 2028 for the maori wards to be removed? They should be immediately removed if voted out. Sick of all the maorification of NZ and maori clipping the ticket everytime we sneeze. | Kevan |
| these people are elected to enable the community to advance, not to kowtow to a selected minority. WE ARE ONE PEOPLE | William |
| at best! | Michael |
| The rate increase is insane. They completely ignored a poll about Maori wards and implemented them even with a resounding no. The roads have so many traffic lights (Kapiti Road) that it’s hellish at peak travel times.they have a lovely new office building too. But otherwise it’s not as bad as other places | Cath |
| The fiasco over the Buddhist monstrosity in Waiwera is one example why aren’t the community consulted | Jan |
| Wasteful spending. Overriding democracy by installing unelected iwi members onto council committees at ratepayers expense. Ignoring the wishes of ratepayers. | Steve |
| While there is not much Maori interference the Council does not stay within their budget and waste money on festivals etc. | Errol |
| A rating of Poor is kind imho given the exorbitant rates increases & the diversion of rates money to causes local authorities should have nothing to do with. | John |
| Totally disgusted with Kaipara District Council, a couple of years back, i asked a multitude of legitimate questions, under the OIA, only to received total non-answers, one question i asked, was a proper breakdown of council spending e.g. how much does the council spend on “consultants”, they answered that contractors and consultants are lumped together!!!! I have since learned that the CEO directed this to HIDE how much they wasted on consultants, I would have thought, if people in councils are truly qualified for their jobs, that surely, group think tanks/discussions would come up with the best solutions!!!! | Sandra |
| Local Council perform is obsolutely abysmal, no question. The waste of rate payer monies is eye-watering. Council professional staff engage costly consultants to make the decisions professional council staff are paid to do, so there is no blame when thing go wrong. Maori elite have entrenched themselves into the endless pig trough. A big clean out is needed, starting with Maori wards & priviledge. | Greg |
| they should stick to the basics which is what they were originally elected to do. | linda |
| Bloody dick heads the lot of them | John |
| Destroyed Queen Street, more graffiti, more overgrown verges, too much infil housing , Western Springs Speedway closed against the wishes of a lot of people. Does money change hands? | Claire |
| They should be abolished. | Simon |
| Very poor and not improving ours is completely out of control I can’t see more than maybe 2 voted in again also the management of the council needs to be completely overhauled | Peter |
| I hate to agree with slippery Luxo, but he’s right when he says councils need to get back to focusing on the basics and stop interfering in moral and ethical issues. It’s not rocket science, as they say in maturing Maori. | Alastair |
| Tasman rate increase at 8.3% far in excess of the overall inflation rate with no significant attempt to reign in ‘nice to have’ vanity projects | Richard |
| Irresponsible, incompetent and moarification of the council without the vote from the people. | Russell |
| Rate rises are unacceptable for fixed income people | James |
| Waste money | David |
| Woke and gravy train grifters. No accountability with rate money and spending on fripperies. | Eileen |
| Shocking wasters, couldn’t budget their way out of a paper bag | Peter |
| I think Wayne Brown has done good for Auckland by focusing on infrastructure.it will be the litmus test for the stupidity of Aucklanders if he is not voted back in. The problem is the many stupid councillors who have no idea of the core functions of their job. Ratepayers beware who you vote for or your rates will double | Bruce |
| Need to stick to the essentials | Martin |
| New Zealanders railed against apartheid in the 1980s – we can do it again! | Gray |
| we have suffered appalling abuse of authority constituting criminal corruption unlawful prosecutions and seven years of misery | Robert |
| Too many nice to have projects. | Richard |
| This not so subtle infiltration into local and central government must stop, and stop NOW. Enough is enough. | Martyn |
| High debt levels are pushing up rates because of nice to haves. This may be due partly to Govt water regulations also. | Bruce |
| The local secondary school is maorified A library in the middle of town has a maori name | Neville |
| remove racialism | Mat |
| We have questionnaires asking to hear from the ratepayers and how they value our suggestions and inputs. The council takes absolutely no notice and does it their way. | Chris |
| They seem totaly deceived at the continued attempt for separate sovereignty by Maori. Couple this with their going way behond gthe basic job of councils and spending rate payers money on services that were never provided by Dene them. | Dene |
| MAYOR IS FINE AS A PERSON BUT IS OUT OF HIS DEPTH AS REAL CEO OF A COMPANY | WILLIAM |
| “Poor” is NOT low enough – it is total racist CRAP. | Brian |
| Grey Street Gisborne – “Streets for People” project has been a shambles, 95% of ratepayers see it as a total waste of money. Original cost estimate of $350,00 blew out to over $950,000. Total incompetance. | Garth |
| Blenheim now has a new library and Art Gallery- hugely expensive. 3 Maori words meaning ?????- We need LIBRARY and ART GALLERY so LOCALS and TOURISTS know what/where they are! Expensive SCULPTURES dotted around – WHY SCULPTURE when we have raw sewerage in the streets with heavy rain!! | Lyn |
| Councils should provide basic services. No more. Aucklands exorbitant rates are a clear and present symptom of inflated bureaucracy and all of the insideous side effects that it produces. I am in a very good position to comepre…..most Aucklanders are not. | charles |
| Council expenses are spiralling out of control. Infrastructure is being ignored. We need practical thinkers, not woke bureaucrats in love with pet, nice to have projects. | Judith |
| concernedratepayers.nz | john |
| Marlborough District Council, our rates are going sky high through miss management. They are iinsolvent and like many councils , who are in the same boat borrowing heavily to cover their incompetence. It’s as you will see from the latest news letter | Rob |
| Our council, KCDC, has been captured by the Labour ‘narrative’ around Maorification etc. They have instituted Maori wards against a district-wide, but sadly, non-binding poll, which showed we ratepayers did NOT want them! And they have a Maori ‘Advisory Board’ as well! | Donna |
| Far too much money gets wasted on “favourite” programs or back handers. Council Mayor and Councilors are not held responsible for their acts. | Noel |
| spending on things not relevamt & trying to put kids in with voting rights – wow crazy stuff | Jill |
| DCC – they get an average from me, albeit a begrudging one. This is only on the basis that the current Mayor and councillors have not embarked on any massive vanity projects. Their core infrastructure work appears to be managed adequately enough. That’s about it though, as there are some major concerns with the overarching agenda of some councillors. Also, they appear to have no financial constraint and have no clear plan to address the burgeoning debt and the hideous cost of servicing debt interest payments. To be a little more accurate with my opinion of the Dunedin City Council I would rate them a 3.5 to 4.0 out of 10.0 at best. | Mark |
| And rightly so too, I’m not that impressed to date and am worried for the future, particularly as our mayor is in favour of a Maori ward. | Mike |
| And getting worse | Thomas |
| Ever since the salary for councils was put up we have had a trail of useless people who don’t know what they are doing. | Wayne |
| Corruption in local authorities is gaining massive momentum..time for a clean out of these low life puppets of the tribal stoneage savages. | Chris |
| Too many vanity projects. Poor leadership | Jim |
| Ideologically deluded about their individual grasp of economics | Bob |
| Local guvmint has been hijacked by the CEOs in concert with Iwi. They believe they can do anything they wish and ratepayers are unable to stop them. | Maurice |
| A classic example is the anti vehicle humps, ehump. A pointless waste of materisl, machinery and manpower which would of repaired a lot of roads. Apart from that, in a rural town it increases carbon footprint npg only for cars, but stock trucks, logging trucks, agricultural contractors etc.. as they have to slow down to negotiate these obstacles then work up through the gears to get back to operational speed!!! | Gary |
| Still spending $millions on nice to have ‘cultural’ projects, especially here in P Nth | Bruce |
| Most councilors are hobbled by the CEO (Town Clerk). Who are invaribly paid too much and have too much influence | Sam |
| Very poor and woke get shot of them | Bob |
| A lost council, not knowing what they are doing expect to be re-elected. | Johan |
| We are one people under one flag with one Monarch. It is past time for some HONESTY er history, as far as some Maori AND the nutcase Greens are concerned. | William |
| Local Govt is directed by LGNZ. Most people don’t even know that LGNZ even exists. How do I know this? by the response from people when it is metioned, asking “what is LGNZ?” It does go deeper though. I see LGNZ as the government’s “go between” to Local Govt. LGNZ is not answerable to rate payers, who vote in councils and mayors. From what I have seen, LGNZ is a law unto itself, and arrogant to boot. LGNZ has a relationship with IWI Chairs. Deals and schemes are done between the two without my input, or even knowledge, except when the deals are announced. What the? Them there is the Government, handing down instructions to LGNZ, mostly so it looks like they are not getting their hands dirty. then where do the government take their instruction from? Good question. being that the “government” is not a sovereign entity, but a privately owned corporate body. A company! Responsible to the “share holders/owners”. Again WT? so when you consider all the ho ha about reforming water, where do all the reasons, costs, schemes, alternate schemes, studies, and resolutions that something really needs doing to our water supply because it is nasty and broken come from. Says Who? I have always believed that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Well, our water ain’t broke. Where does it all come from? The (unelected) UN agenda 2030, the (unelected criminal racketeering) WEF and the (straight criminal) WHO. This is where the problems stem from. What is the answer then? De-centralization. The present system is there to progressively impoverish the people. Little by little, the comunist way. The reason is power and control over everything and everyone. The term for that is Slavery. That’s where they are sending us folks. When you know, you can kick back. Rates capping? When you understand that rates are “voluntary”, surely the next step is a country wide response of not paying any more rates. Read Ken Shirley’s post here. | Neil |
| Nelson City Council completely ignore the wishes of the residents and simply ignore democratic processes where the clear, proven majority of residents’ votes are ignored. Meanwhile Council spends large amounts of money of replacing a pavement (NZ$3 million) and ignore vital work. A very significant proportion of the NCC staff are paid well in excess of $100,000 pa.and Council proposes to increase rates. Shame on these absolute dictators. The litany of social disaster continues and the examples I can produce of Council acting in self-interest rather than for the people are far-reaching. | Nicholas |
| Too concerned with social and green issues etc and are not doing what they are voted in for — ie looking after the ratepayers !!!!!! | Alan |
| Just ripping us for not much | chuck |
| Not as bad as some | Leah |
| Nelson. Terrible, lefties, fiscally ignorant, arrogant and out of control. Last 12 months just one major cockup waste of money after another. The council model is broken. | Murray |
| Far too many grandiose ideas rates are far to expensive almost unaffordable for the average home | Barbara |
| Average to poor. Bring back accountability and sack a lot more of them. Consequences/examples are needed. | mike |
| I’m praying that people who are concerned about what’s happening in Wellington get off their backside and vote. Otherwise the well organised Green machine and its friends in Labour will dominate the next 4 years with their ideologically driven agenda. | John |
| My Nelson rates have increased over 12 times the increase in the CPI since 2008, with much of the funds going to non-essentials. | Dan |
| over run with useless interferring bureaucrats.canterbury regional council is a disgrace-corrupt thieves.canterbury can not afford to carry these bludgers. | William |
| Waimakariri may be more conservative. | steph |
| Vote for Act candidates at the next local elections, should get the wok under control. | Owen |
| parasites tax at will. farmers pay extortionate rates for almost no return,ie. subsidise urban services. | Pattie & Paul |
| Not enough emphasis on core infrastructure | Jane |
| PNCC are ignorant | chris |
| maori take way more out of the economy than they contribute, if multi ownership Maori entities refuse to pay rates, councils have toque All owners to recover the rates so, maori land with hundreds of ‘owners’ can escape paying rates as its too expensive to sue every owner. This has to be changed. | James |
| They are not really efficient at running a town city or farming area. Money comes easy from ratepayers and taxpayers but doesnt take them long to spend it all without thinking | Barbara |
| It’s too simplistic to blame the ramblings of a Marxist PM for a situation that was created by her. The blame must be shouldered by the next government to take power, John Key and the National party for not rectifying the problem, that’s what real leaders would do. | Rex |
| It is wrong to allow councils to increase rates by more than the rate of inflation | Keith |
| RATES and other loal charges are out of line. Streets and city planning needs reviewing as street mainainance is NOT keeping up. Speed BUMPS are excessive and damaging vehicles meaning additional repairs. | Carl |
| They keep getting tied up in in the current legislation and need to bulldoze these away as they are slowing down progress we all need to see happening. The prime minister needs to drive this rather than ignore it. If he does not it is unlikely he will be voted in next election | malcolm |
| This deceit has to stop!! Support Shane Jones & get rid of Regional Councils! Ecan dealing in property (Odeon Theatre site) for one way beyond any mandate!,! Councils elected by the people for the people to carry out the work required by the people(ratepayers)!!! All the councils are politically influenced &,are playing the race card! WHAT IS THE REQUIREMENT TO PLACED ON THE MAORI ROLL?? | Ron |
| Need to stop wasting money on ideological ideas and projects. Spending needs to be JUST on basic services. | Jim |
| Not enough attention to the basics and too much spent on fancy, not necessary projects that don’t benefit the ratepayers. Would be different if it was their own money they were spending! | Lee |
| There should be a spot for thieving scoundrels! Poor is far too polite! | peter |
| Council too woke, spending unnecessary ratepayers money of woke, Maori and not enough on infrastructure. Being too political in their decision making, rather than focusing of Council priorities. | Kathryn |
| Wellington City Council would have to be the poorest performing Council in the country | Alison |
| Need to review all councilors agendas | Anthony |
| They do not listen to rate payers when issues of importance are implemented like speed bumps cycle ways parking and all the bull shit regarding Maori names like when one does a development thy insist that the street name has to be Maori and when challenged they refuse to back down. I am so sick of the bowing down by central and local to all things Maori that if i was younger i would take my money and be out of here. | Ken |
| Hopeless and abismal | Colin |
| Average at best. However, given the change in emphasis that was forced on them, the average score is hardly surprising. | Peter |
| Rates rises are far higher than the average figures reported by councils. They’re wasting our money on major Maori projects which solely benefit maori. A Nationwide rates strike needs to happen. | Koreen |
| Well summarised. The well beings are straight out of Agenda 2030. Jones needs to focus on these Central Government impositions instead of RC’s. | John |
| Shocking performance by all councils both fiscal and culturally. They seem to lack any common sense on either topic. A complete overall is urgently required. Legislation needs to be introduced on performance and the ability to dismiss officers failure due to incompetency. This may seem hash but the time is well overdue for a serious review. | chris |
| Chronically unable to live within their means | Terry |
| Ratepayers of Christchurch are “forced” to shoulder costs of projects way beyond their intended function. Pouring millions of our money into restoring a church we don’t own that is now an eyesore and embarresment, pouring much more into a “nice to have” stadium slap in the middle of town rather than a location significantly more able to handle huge crowds and their transportetc and on land of considerable less value. (just two examples.) | Roger |
| Our DC average – most poor! | Bruce |
| All the points made in your article referring to “takeover” are present along with the false notion of partnership. The balance of Council seats is loaded, against democracy, as was intended by the last Labour Government. Rates are excessive and way above value received. | Peter |
| Local councils are immune from any real change by the apathy of ratepayers. Central government needs to act decisively and urgently because it will be TOO LATE if left to their current pace. I do not think the government is actually OPPOSED to co-governance. The fools in National will be out of a job come the next election, but they do not seem to realise it. | ken |
| No vision, a passion to spend with limited accountability. Staff seem more empowered than the elected councillors. Seems light on experience, consultants employed at a drop of a hat. WBDC desperately in need a high-level review as to performance, delivery and accountability! Poor performing mayor with a culture bent to Maori! | Graeme |
| The condition of the roads in some local area is poor – repairs are not holding up. Patches are disintegrating. Thus money and time are being wasted. Do it once and do it correctly. | Paloma |
| … and the promised changes are happening too slowly. | Laurie |
| Local authorities have to give effect to Regional Council Policy Statements that are too complex and require extremely high & conservative environment thresholds to the point where there is no pathway for urban development to occur, so councils defer plan changes to re-zone out beyond Long Term Plans hampering housing supply and making it more expensive. | Scott |
| A 50/50 council so expected. LG has been captured by the Left – as advocated by Nanaia Mahuta for He Puapua ends. | mary |
| I think our local city council has been average. Our Council has done some “pet” projects with “nice to haves” rather than “need to have”. However more recently they are focusing on the need to have which is great. However, our local Otago Regional Counciil it far too focused on green things. I am all for protecting the environment, but they go far too far. And as for their new local offices, they have certainly gone FAR TO FAR. | Keith |
| Ridiculously so ! – elected to administer $billions – with often NO business experience | Hylton |
| An independent audit board should be established to ensure local councils keep to their mandates and all reports must be transparent and available to everyone. | Trevor |
| Some have thrown money around like water | Patrick |
| I know that my Rates have gone up. I think having the Maori on councils has been a very bad idea. | william |
| Introducing a Maori ward was the death knoll of democratic balance.. | jim |
| Marlborough District Council loves vanity projects | Biris |
| They are not concentrating on the basics and have unelected Maori with voting rights on council | Gareth |
| Council must remember that the rates paid by ratepayers is not theirs they only manage the funds not enjoy them | Warren |
| Rates out of control, services slipping backwards and extravagence / waste is to be seen everywhere. | Clive |
| When basic infrastructure needs are not being met it is clear that they have lost their way. As for the rates increases, rate payers, like tax payers, do not have bottomless pockets. Get back to need to haves not nice to haves. As for co-governance and Maori wards- racism regardless of what some think. | David |
| WCC is not interested in listening to their constituents. The ouncil is clearly run by council officers who deliberately misinform councilors with their overblown and overwritten reports. Unfortunately WCC has been dictated to by both Labor and the Green parties to the detriment of the city. The city itself is now a rundown shambles. It i disgraceful and people should be held to account. | Jane |
| ARE DOING A GOOD JOB IN CONTROLLING RATES, BUT ALSO WANT A PARTNERSHIP WITH IWI | nOEL |
| Poor. I base this off of reckless and unnecessary spending. I’m also tired of the never-ending echo chamber of conformity, groupthink, and incompetence – in fact, not just in local government, but society as a whole. I’m not looking foward to the local elections… roughly 40% of those I vote for get in, but this number needs to rise to at least 70%. There’s too much feel good virtue signalling for the candidates who are fit for the job to compete with. | Cian |
| Good infrastructure but Feilding has the most expensive small town rates in NZ. Need to stop spending. | Jill |
| And full of Maorification | steven |
| Too much $$ given to iwi and marae repairs, including work contracts that should have been put out for public consult (Wanganui) | Noeline |
| New Plymouth Council has made some stupid decisions, especially with expensive new road layouts, parking and vanity projects with excessive rates rises. | Geoff |
| I cannot begin to express my disgust, for the disgraceful performance of local government for their wanton arrogance and disdain for the people who pay their exorbitant salaries with no oversight on performance. | Rob |
| The power went to their heads and they started to build monuments to themselves and forgot their core business until they started falling to bits , instead of keeping the maintenance up. Before this happened they had to keep rates below inflation ,but since they have skyrocketed | Colin |
| They do need to get back to there basic functions and leave all the rest alone. No rates increase more than the inflation rate, | John |
| They’re too tied up with 15 minute city stuff instead of core responsibilities. They ignore ratepayers actual needs or concerns. | Bryan |
| Get back to core services. Mow the bloody berms for a start! | Terry |
| I have not seen a local councillor in my area in the six years as a resident | Allan |
| As you know Kerikeri is now a Bi Lingual town. All new street signs are in Maori (which newcomers and old) can not pronounce. The council is disreguarding theie residents. | Patrick |
| Poor to Very poor. They have lost their way. | Tony |
| they need to stick to CORE services and forget all the nice ta haves | LesW |
| Used to think Wellington was nearly as bad as Lower Hutt. Now the converse is more true. The city is run down. Pavement potholes (never happened years ago) versus Pride pageantry. | Lawrence |
| Wellington is probably about the worst in the country | Donald |
| Spend on nonsense, speed humps everywhere, bus stops Centre road. Roads slimmed to reduce traffic. | Steve |
| THis is Auckland. | Geoff |
| Too many wants and not enough needs. | Sue |
| Large amounts of ratepayers money going on “feel good, nice to have projects” . Maori signage everywhere and now being verbally pushed on all AT transport. | Lawrie |
| Huge rates increase, too much spending on non essential projects and allowing unelected councilors voting rites. Bring on the rates capping law. | Peter |
| An example- Potholes temp repaired over and over again without a proper fix. Another, vanity projects no-one wants. | Glenn |
| In a state of inertia, clueless. | Chris |
| Tauranga City Council is giving most of assets to Maori. Not bad when their land was sold to the missionaries and then given back to them. May be we can all claim land that has been sold by our ancestors. Imagine how far we would get. | Marlene |
| Brown and his lot will not get our vote.. | Don |
| Tauranga City Council | Russell |
| They are just wasting ratepayers money on what they want and not on what the ratepayers need. | Lawrence |
| Wellington – nothing more to say | John |
| Drysdale is despicable | Hone |
| our local mayor seems absent. No new initiatives, other then some woke virtue signalling. Costs too much | Charles |
| The imbalance within local authorities is clearly apparent, with serious and unacceptable consequences. For this country to survive as a democracy, changes must occur! | Grahame |
| Too much money is wasted. They should stick to the basics | Bev |
| Wellington & Kcdc….poor, | John |
| need complete over haul and become cost effective not putting up rates that our strangling property owners | peter |
| The anti car lobby has destroyed Auckland! | Murray |
| Lost for words!!! | Colleen |
| Piss poor. | Des |
| Poor for the amount of money they go through. | John |
| Extremely poor | Mark |
| Hastings District Council is appalling notwithstanding the impact of Cyclone Gabrielle. Thank goodness Mayor Sandra Hazelhurst is standing down because she seems to be a big part of the problem – and to think I voted for her. | pdm |
| Super city does not work as far aa I am concerned, I also certainly oppose Maori wards, we are supposed to be one people. | Fraser |
| Need a change. | Ian |
| Over spending on non essentials. No accountability and no listening to voters | Anne |
| extremely poor! | Robin |
| Brown is all talk no do | Allan |
| Taupo District Council is a poor performer and seeks to hide their activities from ratepayers. Councillors have said that public meetings are not good because ratepayers get ‘angry’. Ratepayers are seldom consulted and the whole council needs a cleanout in October. | Roger |
| It’s a shame that sh_t wasn’t an option! | Glenda |
| Auckland has a huge disfunction between ratepayer groups and the senior management staff. We need to go back the just who should be responsible for the rates spend. and just who accountable for who is ultimatly responsible ? | Maurice |
| the rate increases alone, without going into more example, dictate “poor”! | Giles |
| LGNZ is an alt left lead organisation that needs to be held to account for their antics. A very dangerous group who, I belive need to be removed from any decision making. | Jim |
| Who needs expensive cyclists as in Tauranga | Heather |
| Ideologically captured and inept | Geoff |
| Poor planning, poor services and continual rates increases. Elected representatives seem to have no control of the massive bureaucracy that council organisations have become. | Rod |
| Carterton District Council has made a concentrated and apparently successful effort to keep any rates increase to a sensible level. It also seems that they favour terminating any imput from the Regional Counil. | Ian |
| One-sided, twisted and dominated by iwi | Graham |
| CCC rate increases are beyond the pale | Allan |
| too many half wits on council, but mayor is good value | Gill |
| too much waste and red tape | gavin |
| they have no idea | steve |
| Councils have been slack on maintenance of existing assets . They have been burdened by Government legislation and have deferred justifiable rate increases due to public pressure. Councillors represent all citizens and are expected to authorise an appropriate mix of expenditure. They also want to be re-elected. They often don’t have the wherewithal to do justice to their position. Our last council agenda had 1350 pages ( I am not a councillor) which is huge and would overwhelm the average person. Rate caps won’t work. Referendums on items not in the strategic and long term plans will slow progress. Deferred infrastructure builds and maintenance will be funded by borrowing. Who would want the job? | Mike |
| Local authorities have become an easy route for the indigenous minorities to gain overly disproportionate leverage over the non- indigenous majority | Hugh |
| Too much time, energy and gold being wasted on wokeness. | Alastair |
| Auckland Council and AT exhibit no fiscal responsibility and an absolute contempt for their ratepayers. Hopefully the end is near for their lack of prudence and vanity. | Mike |
| Incredible number of Millions spent on cycleways & walkways & now a 15% increase as they obviously bought into 3 waters now the cost are here | Peter |
| Basically good in Kapiti, but way over representation of Maori views , via Tribal advisors; as well as proposal for Maori Ward. All important openings have Maori korero/waita as the first happening; and names for places are “gifted” Maori names by local Tribal leaders which are perforce accepted. We shall be voting against having a Maori Ward, but the place is so ver “woke”, we’ll probably get one. | Rochelle |
| Council does not listen to the rate payers. They’re rogue | Grant |
| I know the mzyor of selwyn council is totally ‘woke’. He needs to go | sandra |
| Get rid of regional councils and limit local councils to rates rubbish and local roads & water | Sally |
| Unfortunately the unelected 4 Commissioners in Tauranga for the past 4-5 years have destroyed our city by racking up huge debt, some which the current Council will not be able to change. We, the ratepayers, will never recover from this for many years, and some will have to sell their homes because they cannot afford to pay the rates.. | Robyn |
| tauranga council does everything 3 times and in some cases still gets it wrong a total waste ot our rates and they do NOT like deing told they are wrong | adrian |
| Wellington City Council is a disaster with just 3 councilors voting against the disasterous 10 year plan. The labor, green lot must GO. | Dave |
| useless bloody useless | Laurie |
| Too much involvement with non core council activities, ie cycleways, maori relations. Spending money on legacy projects is not what our rates should be spent on when core activities, water, sewerage, footpaths, roading fall into disrepair | Alec |
| Woke on steroids. Cut the apartheid crap, which means no to co-governance and no to racist Maori wards. Get back to basics and spend within your means – endless rate rises are disgraceful. | Colin |
| Woeful! | Gary |
| Moving increasingly woke and captured by iwi interests. | john |
| Poor on all counts, unfortunately. Councils still insist on vanity spending instead of just sticking to basics, roading, providing water and getting rid of waste. | Trevor |
| Upper hutt council just spent over 60 million dollars on upgrade of swimming pool. Money they did not have. Our next rates increase currently at 19.9 % and for the next 3 years. Unsustainable. Looking at selling up and moving. Currently 25% of my in hand pension, by 2028 will it be 50% ? Mobile home looking like only option for me in my seventies. | Alan |
| Let the local governments hold referendums. | Ronald |
| Only average. Too much feather-bedding of maori | David |
| The local dam was pushed through at around $140M , the final cost was over $200M. The ratepayers are stuck on the hook for a vast proportion of the cost whilst the growers managed, with the council’s approval, to get away with not paying their correct share. Consequently Tasman’s borrowing is way out of control and our services and infrastructure is poor. So no, they are not doing well. I also feel that the Mayor and councillors should be limited to two or three terms; it would prevent them getting too cozy with council staff. And finally, closed door meetings or workshops should be stopped. | Laura |
| The political correctness that has invaded the Auckland council is killing the city. With the next local body elections coming up, the PC brigade need to be advertised as to just what they have done to the city, they have to go, we as voters have to get rid of these parasites | Merryl |
| They only listen to themselves | Roy |
| I am a Waikato Regional Councillor and rate both WRC as poor and HCC as extremely poor. Change needs to occur but is only possible if voters support those wanting to make change and wind back the waste on unmandated activities including Maori ward seats and cultural reports for any consenting process. | Chris |
| They are all too interested in Maori involvement and treaty issues and unnecessary projects. | DAVID |
| Marlborough City Council has pushed the maori customs all the way around the county: why should we see maori language everywhere we go???? Library, schools, and many more. This is SICKENING! always pushing these customs without knowledge and approval from the public! All of us ARE ONE! NO RACE DISTINCTION!!! | Dominique Greenslade |
| No real desire to kerb rate rises. | Graham |
| We are completely pee’d off with all correspondence being largely and predominently in Te Reo or a pidgin version of English. FNDC has messed with making Kerikeri a bi-lingual town which most do not want while basic services suffer, weeds, overgrown verges, road surfaces rough as hell, etc. | Doug |
| it’s easy to spend other peoples money | RAY |
| We are just to see if Water is controlled outside of council. A backward step if it is | David |
| Taupo has good water, sewage system and roads. The problem in Taupo is the high number of staff. To manage the Red tape laid out by central Government | RICHard |
| Not good performance. They seem more worried about Maori culture and climate change than getting on with looking after roads, making sure footaths are functional, vegetation is kept clear, weeds are under control. Too much spent on bureaocracy, red tape, green tape and brown tape. | Janine |
| Local officials have been trying to benefit only the IWI & tribal desires not the majority of the Rate Payers | Michael Andrew |
| They favour Maori over all the rest | Gavin |
| Maori now run Waikato regional council They are routing the system Its gone beyond tolerance and the non Maori community are at boiling point | malcolm |
| Poor decision making often. Cost blowouts often. Too many nice to haves often at too high a cost to the ratepayers. Need to return to core requirements. | Noel |
| Under Hazelhurst leadership Hastings hasn’t had an Emergency Management Plan since 2019! Land Drainage assets haven’t been maintained and consent gone unmonitored | Alexandra |
| sick of it | DOUGLAS |
| A lot of the time they appear to be more interested in their own personal agenda, than what is good for their local area. | Malcolm |
| Rates out of control, wasteful spending. Napier needs a good cleanout of Mayor and Council. | Ross |
| I have been paying rates since 1973. As rates have increased Council performance has decreased. | Grant |
| The tauranga city council needs to be investigated by the Serious Fraud Office it is that corrupt | Tracy |
| fiscal prudence and sensible decisions are absent from local government and there is no control from the National government who also show the same disrespect for our money | Alastair |
| have voted Average as I do think they are doing a pretty good job, as a smaller rural Council it certainly is easier. However the rate increase certainly stops them from a Good Vote. Unfortunately so many of their actions are dictated too by legislation and that needs to change. | Phil |
| Totally no interest in controlling costs vs expanding the turnover of the organization to ensure more growth in staffing and operational costs | Grant |
| Too much spent on nice to have projects instead of basics. Example, Auckland’s GI to town waterfront walkway. Nice photo op for Desley Simpson & Auckland Transport, not finished. Cost $ ??? And not much use to Ratepayers. | Chris |
| Failure to focus on the basic must-haves | tony |
| In my experience, low average. | Terry |
| Only voted Poor because you didn’t offer a worse alternative! | Jon |
| Wasteful spending!! | Terry |
| Too may vanity projects and delving into areas that aren’t their concern. For example, opposing the Treaty Principles Bill. Local Government does not have a mandate to interfere or purport to represent the views of its constituents | Peter |
| Since major changes. | Murray |
| Getting worse! Reform needs to happen now!!! | Les |
| We need to return governance to its original intent – service management for NZ community. With limits, accountability and non-racially based policies reinstated. | Andrew |
| Auckland council under the leadership of Mayor Brown is at least addressing the issue. | Graeme |
| Far to much dictatorial bureaucrats and every new facility having a meaningless Maori name – even libraries. | Laurie |
| too much Maori crap!! | jeremy |
| too many vanity projects and feel nice bs and getting away from basics | john |
| WCC performance: dreadful! | Alan |
| They wouldn’t spend this money so badly if it was their own!! | Sharon |
| What happens when idiots get elected to run Multi Million dollar businesses. We need to change how these authorities are managed and run. | DAVID |
| I’m currently involved in the lodging of an elected members complaint about a breach of the Local Government Act 2002 involving the waste of ratepayer funds. Some 15 weeks later the “investigation” into this simple case is unresolved. I’m sure there is a great deal o f whitewashing involved – great work Auckland City Council. | Peter |
| Get rid of them. Just another bludge for ratepayers. | Mike |
| Nelson has progressed backwards over the past 12 years. | Jim |
| no consideration of voters or their preferences | Mike |
| too much racial bias in tauranga | John |
| Too much maori and not enough to enhance the area for evereyone | Robyn |
| Napier Council is woke and maorified. All candidates for Council in the coming elections need to openly state how they will vote on Maori Wards and certain other similar issues, so that the Public can know clearly who they will vote for without any cover ups. | Greg |
| The Maori Coup is either stopped very soon, or it becomes permanent. | Howard |
| Useless ! | Craig |
| No focus and priority given to the basic function of a municipal council, just wasting raye payers money on cultural ideology. | Leonard |
| Poor, but what else could be expected when we, in Tauranga, were subjugated by four commissars appointed (at great the great expense to the ratepayers) by that racist part Maori, Mahuta? | Alan |
| Wellingtom Regional and CC both meed a colonic lavage | anthony |
| Rates are through the roof, quality of services getting worse. Too much spent on cultural bollox. And Maori seats are just a racist waste of money. | Dave |
| All local councils are creatures of statutes and like it or not, central government and local councils must be inextricably intertwined. In other words, corporations working hand in glove. There’s the problem right there. Neither our central government or local councils should be operating as for-profit corporations. | neil |
| Local government is a disaster. Our councils are incompetent, and unless proper controls are introduced, it’s hard to see things improving. | David |
| Why haven’t the changes been introduced already? The Coalition has become ‘all talk’ and no action. It is not good enough. We didn’t elect them to sit on their hands. Meanwhile councils waste money on stupid projects and fail to fix things that matter! | Maureen |
| Our council has been captured by Maori. No-one stands up to them. It is a scandal. What is the government going to do to stop that happening. Do they need to appoint commissioners to run councils like ours? | Paul |
| The opportunity for voter fraud with postal voting is rife. Anyone could take voting papers out of letter boxes and many people wouldn’t even realise they are missing. There don’t seem to be any checks and balances. Don’t we need to go back to single day voting again? | Hugh |
| Councils need to be restrained. There are too many staff making stupid decisions that elected councillors have no control over. Reducing staff and regulation would be a good start. Then we need to encourage good people to stand! | Simon |