Down with the kids?
Posted: June 19, 2012 Filed under: Campaigning, Christchurch, Local Government 2 Comments »This just in from Christchurch.
The right-wing local government ticket, “Independent Citizens” have undertaken a bold new re-branding exercise to ensure they are relevant to the youth of the city.
Ladies and gentlemen… I give you… iCitz!
If you live in the Riccarton-Wigram ward, then this alone should be reason to vote for Natalie Bryden, the People’s Choice-Labour candidate for the current local board by-election. Get out there and vote!
Christchurch – Making Progress
Posted: February 21, 2012 Filed under: Christchurch, Labour, Local Government, Policy 3 Comments »I’ve sat down a number of times to write about what I saw, felt and thought on 22 February 2011.
I was in town having lunch…I crossed it to get back to work and check on staff … then trekked out again on foot to get home and deal with flooding and liquefaction.
I saw things I’ll never forget.
I can’t or won’t watch a great deal of footage – it’s still way too raw. But really I think I’m just sick of the damn day, and I’m especially sick of the media treatment of it, as though that’s the bit that matters. So I’m not going to inflict another overwrought account of that day on you. It’s not 22 February that truly matters – as a progressive, it’s what comes after that matters.
Following the quake “munted” quickly became the word of the moment; hell it became the word of the last year. But as a friend reminded me when he visited from Melbourne, “munted” just doesn’t cut it.
There is no other way to say it: Christchurch is fucked.
We need Christchurch to work. Calls to abandon it, move it, or supplant it are idiotic and ill informed. The nation needs an effective alternative to Auckland and for all sorts of reasons that place is and will remain Christchurch.
But I’ve spent much of the last year angry, upset, and generally frustrated with what I see as the failure of many, and especially our leaders (local and national), to engage with what’s actually happened in Christchurch. That goes double for those who ought to know better – those on the left.
Plenty of people have been working hard – I don’t accuse anyone of laziness. But way too many continue to confuse heat with light, energy with results – just because you’re busy, doesn’t mean you’re doing any good.
What I’ve found particularly frustrating is that Christchurch is a city full of need and opportunity. It’s a city full of fear and anger – crying out for those of us on the left to turn that into hope and action.
Certainly, I have my own views about a large number of policy issues including Transport, Environment, Housing, Health, Small Business, Arts, and Local Government to name but a few. I’m sure I’ll write about them over the next year.
But, on this the anniversary of the quake that broke my city, I want to issue a challenge:
To the Labour Caucus – every one of you.
You have a year – a year to understand how rebuilding Christchurch presents a challenge to our nation and an opportunity, in your portfolio, for our party and our country to advance our progressive agenda.
In a year’s time I expect all of you to be able to articulate and advance policy that will help rebuild Christchurch, and build a stronger more progressive nation.
You will need to come to Christchurch regularly. It is quite clear to me that one cannot understand what is happening here without seeing it in person.
You must not accept the government’s notion that this can and should be managed through one Ministerial portfolio. Lianne is doing an excellent job of holding the Minister to account, but she alone cannot fix the problems or seize the opportunities before us. You must come to see your portfolio through the lens of Christchurch.
Ours is a city of new horizons, it could be the most progressive city in the most progressive country in the world. We can build it back green, and progressive. We can throw away old models and ways of doing things. It’s simply up to you to grasp this opportunity – every one of you.
I look forward to hearing from you in a year.
Perspective on Christchurch’s local representation
Posted: February 9, 2012 Filed under: Christchurch Leave a comment »Paul McMahon is a member of the Spreydon-Heathcote Community Board, Chair of the Labour Local Government Committee (Christchurch) and Chair of The People’s Choice (Christchurch 2021): This post is his personal opinion and is not speaking for Labour or Christchurch 2021.
As several other writers have reminded us recently, in the past the Christchurch City Council used to win awards for their community engagement due to the high quality of civic leadership and local democracy: a lot has changed since then. There are serious problems within the Council and in the way it is run and led. The public have a right to feel angry and disenfranchised.
At the protest the feeling of anger and a real desire for change was palpable: this is not a flash in the pan of civic history, it was the beginning of the end of the ruling regime. Change is coming to Christchurch, but what the nature of that change is very much up in the air. We are on shaky ground in more ways than one.
The problems are not new and the current cause is simple: the reigning majority of Councillors, led by the Mayor, have not adhered to the basics of democratic process, oversight and governance. This group has been called the “A-team,” and, according to one local body veteran I know, they are the tightest-knit governing political party Christchurch local body politics has seen within living memory. This grouping has allowed the Mayor and the CEO to dominate our local government, by giving them the votes they need at the Council table and by not requiring due democratic process to be followed. The dysfunction currently under the spotlight is how this ruling party has decided our local government should be run since 2007, but the foundations were laid before then.
Between 2004 and 2007 our local democracy was routed in a pincer manoeuvre of democratic deficit and corporatisation. It was the halving of the number of councillors and the amalgamation of wards (merging wealthier wards with poorer wards) before the 2004 local elections (highlighted by Chris Trotter in a recent piece published in The Press) that delivered the king hit that severely weakened democratic representation on the Council, while the corporatisation (presided over by Mayor Garry Moore and CEO Dr. Lesley McTurk) gutted the Council of its public service ethic, institutional knowledge and, therefore, its capacity to respond adequately to the challenges of the recovery we now face.
Furthermore, I would go as far as to say that the reform programme of the Moore-McTurk era is precisely what has enabled two men, the Mayor and the CEO, to so detrimentally dominate what was once the best governed city in the world. In particular, the dissolution of the standing committee structure, the reduction of the power and role of community boards, the centralisation of service-provision and decision-making, and the proliferation of middle and upper management roles. All of these changes have, directly or indirectly, undermined the supremacy of elected members and elevated the roles of the Executive staff and Mayor.
The solution to the problem is to return to democracy, not to remove it altogether as some are advocating. The prospect of government-appointed commissioners is not one anyone should relish. I understand why it has some appeal, but we have already lost a democratic voice in our Regional Council (Ecan), so losing democratic control of the City Council would mean all the decisions about the recovery of our city would be made in Wellington, disenfranchising us even further.
Christchurch is the people’s city, it is neither the Council’s nor the government’s city, and so it should be the people who decide who governs: and the only way to do that is, whether sooner or later, through elections. Disenchantment with the recovery process will only be heightened, and the democratic deficit increased, if the government installs commissioners. They must be sorely tempted, but it carries with it a lot of political risk: once the government installs commissioners they will shoulder all the responsibility and all the blame.
If there are going to be any radical changes, they should be in-line with the principle of subsidiarity and aimed at giving the community a stronger voice in the recovery from the earthquakes. Rather than centralise decision-making in Wellington, the government should go completely the other way. Instead of concentrating power, they should disperse it into the community through strengthened and empowered community boards, whose job it is to be representatives and advocates for their communities.
Decisions about the recovery should be made as close to the people they affect as possible, as openly as possible and with as much participation by the people of Christchurch as possible. If the government appoints commissioners they will be depriving us, the people of Christchurch, of our local democracy and of the ability to determine the shape of the recovery: that is precisely why people feel frustrated with the Council now!
As people who already feel powerless in the face of over 10,000 earthquakes, losing local democratic representation, even for a time, will rob us of even the little voice we currently have. Change is needed, but it must be democratic and it must be empowering to our suffering communities. If the majority of the Council will not change, then an early election is the only answer.
Letter from Christchurch – Local Government Frustration
Posted: February 1, 2012 Filed under: Christchurch, Local Government Leave a comment »Local government seems to be rising up the ladder of issues people are taking an interest in.
Patrick posted earlier in the week about the Shape the Future group in Wellington.
Aucklanders got briefly interested in how their city’s governed over the last couple of years, but it seemed like a passing fad – and sadly far too few Aucklanders engaged, or continue to be engaged, with what were and are extremely important issues. A pity – the Royal Commission papers and report were fascinating.
Local government has certainly occupied the minds of many residents, ratepayers and citizens here in Christchurch for a number of years, and it’s been a large part of our frustration (still growing btw) with how things have been managed since the earthquakes began. (For those keeping count we just passed 10,000 quakes since September 2010 – here’s the map)
Patrick Leyland
Guest Post
James Caygill
