Look no further than yesterday’s CPI number. It’s one of your top three inflation feeders.
So, throw a cap on them. Tie their hands behind their backs. Reign 'em in!
Get rid of the hundred-thousand-dollar bike rack here, the million-dollar disco toilets there, the coffee machines for staff over there.
But in practice, how do actually make it work without starving these councils of revenue they actual need to fix the pipes?
I spoke to Ben Bell from Gore yesterday. He said almost 90% of council spending there goes on basics - pipes and roads.
The rest is "nice to haves". Libraries and swimming pools etc.
There’s no club sandwiches as council meetings. They're drinking instant coffee.
And yet, Gore’s rate increases have been double digit or close to it for several years. They’ll be close to double digits again this year.
Despite that, the good people of Gore have re-elected Bell for a second term.
So, we say we want lower rates, of course we do, but the question is what will it cost to us? Will capping them actually hurt us? Our local economies, productivity, efficiency.
Last week, Wayne Brown told me on Herald Now that Auckland could have a ZERO increase next year if it wasn’t for the City Rail Link spending coming online.
It’s a major transport project. It'll, in theory, benefit Auckland and the country. It was paid for by both Jaffas and taxpayers.
If we want lower rates, we could just not run any trains on the tracks.
But is that sensible.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m the first to criticise the big spending bozos who chuck money at dumb stuff.
But most council spending isn’t that.
Most of it is stuff we need.
D-day is looming for the government’s plan to cap rates, and it needs to be a measured response. We need spending on pipes and roads to continue and waste on disco loos flushed down the dunny.
Ryan Bridge is a New Zealand broadcaster who has worked on many current affairs television and radio shows. He currently hosts Newstalk ZB's Early Edition - where this article was sourced.
7 comments:
A good starting point with Council costs / spending is salaries. At a guess Councils are the largest employers in any region, the salaries are higher than other employers and the number of staff could easily be slashed. My other guess is that salaries consume 50% of rates revenue
Ryan's usual high standards have dropped here.
It is lazy reporting to use the behemoth train set bill left to mayor brown, as an excuse for the other wallet robbing councils in nz.
The anglo saxon exposed Tauranga Mayor Drysdale is busy with double digit rates rises and increasing tauranga council debt whilst giving $38m of ratepayers property to tribal interests.
It must be thirsty work because drysdale's council spent $470,000 on coffee this year.
Saxon also reports Tauranga Council pays 300 staff over $120000 per annum whilst achieving sloth level productivity.
So come on Ryan, it only took 5 minutes of searching to debunk the rubbish you wrote in this article.
Keep that up and I'll start calling you Jack Tamr.
https://youtu.be/akvHcw4f2XY?si=oULUvgwowLywquMA
The ORC appears to have a 5% increase in wages for staff locked in every year. How can that happen?
Staff numbers and costs are responsible for outrageous rates increases.
Ben Bell might need to have another look at his financial statements publicly available on their own website. It shows approx 50% of expenditure is on pipes and roads. A quarter is spent on swimming pools, arts, parks etc. and while I suspect a lot of Gore residence would be comfortable with having a pool etc it is not true to say there are no "nice to haves" in the Gore budget.
In Wellington over 20% of rates revenue goes to paying, just the interest on the debt. Debt is currently $1.8 billion and budgeted to go well over $2.0billion in 2026. The new Mayor, Andrew Little is already talking of hiring consultants to help work how to sort things out. If so, then many of the highly paid Council staff will need to go because they clearly are not doing their job or are not up to it, otherwise consultants would not be necessary.
One of the first public statements Little made after winning was he wants to talk to Government about the rates cap idea --that is, he does not like the idea.
ahhh..... the old labour party consultant "rates money" laundering trick.
Little used the same scheme for the $50m + tax money he spent on pike river mine reentry, after he'd been correctly told, in no uncertain terms, there was no going beyond the rock wall.... where all the evidence lay.
Wasn't Little the union rep who continually ignored his fee paying members complaints the Pike river mine was very unsafe?
Wellington ratepayer are in for a hell of a debt laden, rates rising, traffic congesting ride!
Has anyone completed an analysis of the average wellingtonian iq? Never mind, its not necesary, we already know the answer.
It's a shame Ryan probably doesn't read the responses to his opinions when they're published on BV, because he's well wide of the mark on this one.
Ryan - the first lesson is NEVER take a politician's word as gospel, because they're ALWAYS parsimonious with the truth.
When Ben Bell says "almost 90% of council spending [in Gore] goes on basics - pipes and roads," he won't be talking about total spending, he'll be referring solely to capital expenditure (capex).
In FY24 (the most recent annual report available), Gore DC's capex was $10.61m. By contrast, its operating expenditure (opex), which includes things like staff wages, interest on debt etc. was $29.421m. So, Bell's "90%" was actually only 90% of 27% of Gore DC's total expenditure!
As with all the other councils, it's actually the opex (staff wages etc.) Gore needs to get under control. But they never talk about that...to paraphrase a magician, "Look over here, look over here, look over here..."
By the way Ryan, all councils are required to publish their annual reports / financial statements on their websites. You could have found this information yourself pretty easily.
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