by Rachel Stewart

To say I abhor local government elections is an understatement.

Every three years we are bombarded with billboards touting insufferable twits who genuinely think they have something more special than the other guy to offer their communities. Mostly, they don’t. Mostly they take up a space that essentially has no real power beyond what is fed to them by the policy staff who want them to do precisely what they want them to do. And they do it.

Mayors usually have an overly warm and cozy relationship with their overpaid CEO and appear to listen to unelected staff more intently than any pesky ratepayer. We know this because they consistently parrot the same lines the staff do. All of this happens because that’s the way it’s now designed to happen.

It’s also rare to see a councilor break ranks these days and, if they do, it’s generally done when it’s not going to affect the outcome of a decision anyway. So it’s safe. And it might mean getting re-elected again. Because, you know, renegade. Yahoo.

Sadly, council governance has become mostly a pointless cabal of easily led puffed up egos who blow and bluster but ultimately achieve nothing that isn’t already mapped out for them well in advance by Local Government NZ.

What’s LGNZ’s purpose? Good question, and one I don’t think even they can really answer.

Am I being too harsh? Nah, I don’t think I am. The animus is real. And rightly or wrongly even central government is now on the warpath.

Councils pay LGNZ an annual fee which is so exorbitant that eight have cancelled their membership – Auckland and Christchurch Waikato Regional Council among them – with all saving hundreds of thousands of our money by doing so. They did not see value for money with many complaining that LGNZ is a self-serving, ‘woke’, left-leaning organisation that is wholly unprofessional. Examples abound.

But LGNZ deputy chief executive Scott Necklen said claims made by councillors wanting to cut ties were “unsubstantiated and factually inaccurate”. Of course he did. He knows that the tide is on the turn for their existence and he’s in panic mode.

All I know for sure is this. Like you, I’ve suffered through many a council election and paid many a rates bill. Year after year you notice things. Like, the bills only ever go one way. Up. It’s like an unspoken local government agreement that spending other people’s money is awesome and never-ending and let’s keep squeezing the citizenry for even more while they get even less. It’s like a tap that never runs dry. Until it does.

And sure you can make submissions and object to the myriad of stupid decisions the councillors make but they’re still gonna’ do what they’re gonna do. In other words, increasingly democracy is just a veneer. They want you to feel you’re included in the process but you’re not. Not really.

I want my rates to go towards the basics. The unsexy stuff. The things that councils are tasked to do. I’m not interested in councillors’ personal views on anything.

I mean, what has possessed these elected (no)bodies to sign off on expensive and needless and ugly rainbow crossings? Or vote to support a ceasefire in Gaza? Or just support Palestine over Israel? Or allow Drag Queen Story Time within ratepayer venues?

Or, in Whanganui’s case, pay millions for an aviation school when Palmerston North has an established and reputable one an hour away? It’s now failed – for a multitude of predictable reasons. Surprise, surprise.

And I’m entirely sick of feeling like I’m renting my own home. The rates are now so high that it feels like Council owns it and I’m just lucky to live in it. Yet, I pay for my own rubbish disposal, and they essentially ignore me if I ask for a dangerous broken footpath to be fixed or a tree not to be murdered by their contractors.

If I were a local government anything right now, I’d start listening. Because not only are the citizenry pissed off, they could soon be revolting. Which we know is how they view us. As peasants.

But peasants have a history of rising up. And owning pitchforks.

Watch the full video here.