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ROCKY BAY NEVER WAS OMIHA

A Waiheke Island Myth Part 1 On Waiheke Island, New Zealand, a myth has grown up among a handful of people in the Rocky Bay Village th...

Friday 3 April 2009

SUMMARISED REACTION TO THE ROYAL COMMISSION

This the letter sent to Gulf News after reading the report of the Royal Commission on Auckland Governance. It is a summary of the much longer posting uploaded last week.

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O goody! The Royal Commission wants Auckland City Council to become Tamaki-makau-rau Local Council. So ACC would be TLC. What a macabre joke!

And the structure the Royal Commission wants is illegal for the rest of the country, because it falls outside the Local Government Act 2002 (see page 664 of the report), so a special Act of Parliament would be needed just for Auckland. Therefore under the heading of local government Auckland would be a country within a country. That would create a local government apartheid. A very bad move.

We should have one law for all New Zealand. Auckland is too full of itself as it is. Underlining its selfishness and arrogance in legislation would be over the top.

The Royal Commission calls its recommendation a unitary council. But it isn't, because it is not a true unified one-layer council. Nor is it the usual two-level structure of regional council and city/district councils. It is this new illegal thing, a mix of regional council and local councils. Neither fish nor fowl.

It recommends for the Hauraki Gulf Islands a few delegated crumbs, which are yet to be decided, except for being allowed to look after our own halls and reserves (big deal!), and one more member on our two community boards. But our representation on councils will be reduced. Our lone councillor would be one of 22 in the TLC. And all we would have on the Auckland Council would be one councillor out of 23 shared with all of Rodney.