Super City or Super Lemon?

I’m consistently amused by all the goings-on north of the Bombay Hills.

The latest Super City fracas is the most current entertainment. Actually I think it’s a great idea. We have a long history of over-representation and over-government (we still have far too many clowns in the big house in Wellington, most of whom are there not to represent their constituents but simply to make up the numbers and follow the party line). But as far as Local Bodies go, why do we need seven local bodies to make up Greater Auckland – and while I’m at it, with roughly a third the population of Greater Auckland why does the Greater Wellington region need six local bodies to look after our needs and wishes?

Now I’d be the first to say that this needs to be done right. You can’t have some Super-Mayor calling the shots for his cronies at the expense of everybody else. And I am concerned that this is exactly what would happen if the current Mayor of Jafaville, Banksy, got his hands on the wheel. Banksy, who is definitely of the opinion that being Mayor of Auckland City means that he is the Greater Power, seems to think that he has the automatic right to be Mayor of Auckland Super City. And sorry Banksy mate, I don’t think that’s necessarily the best call. It’s undemocratic, for a start. And democracy at Local Body level definitely matters.

We have Local Body elections every three years. And while I feel it’s important that I vote (I mean, these clowns are going to be spending my money for the next three years) nine times out of ten, try as I may, I don’t have a clue who, or what, I’m voting for and how it’s going to affect my life. Having to vote for up to twenty Councillers, District Health Board Members, Greater Wellington Regional Council Members doesn’t mean anything to most of us. They may live down the road, have 2.5 children and a pet iguana but what are they going to do once in office? There again they also say you have to be fairly warped to run for Local Government in the first place. Of course we have a lot of that going on in Central Government as well, half the clowns there we never hear of until Election Year cones around and then the ones with the high profiles or the ones that are not going to sneak in the back door on the party list all put their hands up, so we could do with a bit of rationalization in that area as well.

Ideally centralising Local Body affairs would cut out a lot of dead wood, not to mention cutting costs through elimination of duplication of resources. And hopefully with fewer, higher-profile candidates, we might get to know a bit more about them and what they really stand for. In the best of worlds they might actually be accountable to their constituents, of course this is probably hoping too much.

But what has really intrigued me about Auckland’s progression to Super City is this business about Maori Seats. It took the MP for Local Government Rodney 'Perkbuster' Hide threatening to throw his toys out of the sandpit to force the National Party’s hand to say, even at this early stage in proceedings, that it’s not going to happen. And now the Dr. Pita Sharples of the Maori Party is up in arms. “No special Maori seats on the council? That’s not democratic!”

Now excuse me Dr. Sharples. But this is democracy in its purest form. It’s not as if we’re saying that Maori can’t stand for the Super Council. In fact, what we are saying is that if a Maori candidate comes forward is the best person for the job everybody will vote for him (or her). You won’t need to be on the Maori roll, or stand as the token Maori candidate! And that, Dr. Sharples, is what democracy is really about!

Give it back!

While it’s long been suspected that our politicians have only their own best interests at heart, this new spirit of ‘openness and transparency’ over Parliamentary expenses has been a shock to us all.

For the first time NZ taxpayers can see some of the costs associated with the traditional ‘rorting the system’ that has gone on since time immemorial in Parliament. No wonder Deputy Prime Minister Bill ‘We must all tighten our belts’ English has moved to repay just over half of the $24,000 that taxpayers have paid him to live in his own Wellington home for the last six months! While this action was taken after days of English asserting that his expense claims were completely legal, in the middle of a global economic downturn there were much more important things that a Finance Minister should be worried about, with redundancies and cost cutting across all sectors of the economy (including Government departments, but apparently excluding the Government itself) this was a really bad look. However other MPs from all political patries are ‘hanging tough’. They continue to live in taxpayer-funded Ministerial residences or claiming accommodation expenses while renting out their Wellington properties, sometimes to other MPs (who, of course, get an accommodation subsidy)! It all looks like an incredibly cosy, taxpayer-funded money-go-round

ACT MP Sir Roger Douglas is the toughest nut to crack. Originally touted as one of Parliament’s ‘Perk Busters’, ‘Roger the Dodger’ has attempted to justify the use of taxpayer subsidies for travel expenses associated with a trip he took, together with his wife, to England to see his grandchildren. He justifies the expense claim by pointing out that as a result of his time spent serving the public as a politician he is legally entitled to ‘Roger’ the public to the tune of a 90% subsidy of international travel expenses. While it may be legal, in the present economic climate it is certainly not moral. When even backbench MPs earn at least three times the average annual wage, plus expenses and a gold-plated, taxpayer-subsidised superannuation scheme, there is certainly no need for politicians to expect the taxpayer to stump up for their holidays as well. At the present time many taxpayers can only dream about overseas holidays, a fact which has definitely depressed the local travel industry!

Which brings us to the Philip Field affair. Once a promising young MP from the Pacific Islands, Field has just been found guilty of accepting bribes and of corruption. He got a Taiwanese tiler, along with other Asian tradespeople, to work on his properties in Auckland and Samoa on the understanding that he would use his influence to get them New Zealand residency. He could get up to six year’s imprisonment, however under the current regime his wife is still entitled to all his perks as an Ex-MP.

It’s time all Politicians, of all political persuasion, got their snouts out of the public trough and smelt the coffee! Which is why I think the Tom Scott cartoon shows the hypocrisy associated with politics so well! (Is it any wonder we loathe them?)