Reynold Macpherson: An Open Letter to the Editor and to the Mayor and Councillors of Rotorua Lakes Council

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE EDITOR AND TO THE MAYOR AND COUNCILLORS OF ROTORUA LAKES COUNCIL

In February 2025, Rotorua Lakes Council, under Mayor Tapsell’s leadership, transferred decisive influence over Rotorua’s long-term direction to the Te Arawa 2050 Vision Committee. Whether readers support or oppose that arrangement is not the issue. In a democracy, the threshold requirement is that significant shifts in power are transparent, contestable, and subject to ongoing and informed public consent.

This open letter follows from what happened next. When I submitted these documented co-governance arrangements to the Rotorua Daily Post a year later in an op-ed intended to inform readers, I was told I was “drawing a long bow”. In effect, formally adopted council decisions were treated as exaggeration rather than placed before the public for scrutiny. That response raises an important democratic question: how should contested changes in public authority be handled when they are supported by verifiable evidence?

The New Zealand Media Council’s principles provide a clear guide. They emphasise accuracy, fairness and balance, a clear distinction between fact and opinion, and—above all—the primacy of the public interest, particularly where governance, public resources, and democratic accountability are concerned. Publishing substantiated arguments so that readers can judge for themselves is not advocacy; it is the core democratic function of journalism.

Those responsibilities carry added weight in a city served by a single daily newspaper. Where there is no competing local platform, the obligation to reflect a reasonable range of informed perspectives is stronger, not weaker. When evidenced concerns are dismissed rather than aired, debate is narrowed and the conditions are created in which perceptions of media bias inevitably arise. The Media Council’s principles exist precisely to guard against that outcome.

Elected members of council carry an equally demanding obligation. In a representative democracy, councillors and mayors are not simply authorised decision-makers; they are trustees of democratic legitimacy. That role requires them to actively protect democratic participation and to exercise restraint and care in the use of public funds. These duties matter more, not less, when households are struggling with rising living costs.

This responsibility is sharpened by the wider fiscal context. Central government has concluded that only a rates cap is likely to restore discipline in local government spending. Against that backdrop, the public is entitled to ask whether new governance structures, with additional associated costs, meet the same tests of necessity, proportionality, and affordability that ratepayers are being asked to meet.

The public-interest test that applies to journalism applies equally to governance. Decisions must be defensible not only in principle, but in cost, timing, and impact. It is therefore relevant to note that the NZTU’s 2026 Council Pay Rise Dashboard shows the Rotorua mayor’s salary rising by 7.12 per cent to $177,369, while councillors’ salaries have risen by 10.58 per cent to $98,475. These increases may be lawful, but legality alone does not resolve the ethical question of leadership during financial crises.

This letter is written in the spirit of democratic responsibility, not confrontation. It asks the Rotorua Daily Post to give effect to Media Council principles by publishing well-evidenced arguments on contested governance issues, rather than filtering them out. It also asks elected members of Rotorua Lakes Council to demonstrate—through transparent processes, fiscal restraint, and by restoring responsibility for vision-setting to the elected council itself—that democratic consent and public trust remain central to their leadership. Democracy is not weakened by scrutiny; it is weakened when scrutiny is discouraged or quietly set aside.

Reynold Macpherson

Senior Citizen

25 January 2026

Reynold Macpherson was a Rotorua Lakes councillor from 2019 to 2022 and chairman of Rotorua District Residents & Ratepayers from 2013 to 2025.