Bankrupting local government

Local government in Aotearoa is in a crisis. For decades, Boomers have voted to Keep Rates Low, running the infrastructure paid for by previous generations into the ground, while refusing to invest in more (or even repairing what they have). The bill for that is coming due in all sorts of ways - shit on the streets in Wellington, a lethal campylobacter crisis in Hastings, no money to maintain council housing. So rates are going to have to go up. But Boomers still don't want to pay. So National's solution is simply to outlaw rates increases.

I'm struggling to describe the stupidity of this. Rates pay for things. Things we actually need. And those things get more expensive with time, thanks to inflation and population growth. Meanwhile, central government keeps loading costs on councils, with demands for roads, fast-track projects with no infrastructure support, and the never-ending cycle of vetoing and over-riding planning documents, wasting millions of dollars in planning and consultation costs. And now the regime plans to effectively forbid local councils from keeping up with that. Which means declining council services - roads, rubbish, sewage, social housing, parks, libraries - and of course nothing new unless something is cut. It is a recipe for stagnation and decline, central government sabotaging local government, preventing it from meeting its statutory obligations to its people.

As for the "why", apart from the obvious one of pandering to greedy, freeloading Boomers, there's another equally obvious underlying agenda: privatisation. Local councils still own stuff - ports, airports, electricity lines companies, buildings, land. Strangling them financially by diktat will force them to sell that stuff to National's donors and cronies, finally achieving the mass-looting they've been slavering for since the 1990's. And if everything has to be destroyed so the billionaires can steal what is ours, well, that's a price their collaborators in the National Party are willing to pay.

This is not a good policy for New Zealand. It is being sold on short-sighted greed, and being used to deliver public assets into private hands. We need to stop it. And the way to do that is to vote the regime out in November.

No way to run a country

Twenty years ago I joined a protest march over the Manawatū River. Fonterra and local farmers were using the river as a sewer, making it one of the most polluted in the western world, and people were sick of it. The march was a success: the state of the river became a serious issue in subsequent local body elections, and Horizons, the regional council was forced to act. They began a series of public consultations on cleaning up the river, and in 2010 they introduced the One Plan, which set limits for pollution, particularly nitrogen.

Basically, farmers wouldn't be allowed to shit in the river anymore, and they hated it. So they engaged in their usual tactic of predatory delay, dragging the plan through the courts on any excuse in an effort to prevent its implementation. But their appeals backfired, with the Environment Court strengthening the plan and the High Court upholding that. Even then, Horizons tried to rubberstamp pollution, until the courts stopped that as well, and made them actually enforce the law. But the Council's reliance on a tool called Overseer to calculate nitrogen loads caused further litigation, which eventually resulted in a change to the plan.

Which brings us to "Plan Change 2". It updates the nitrogen limits in the One Plan to account for Overseer's software change, and sets out pathways by which farmers who currently exceed them can get temporary consents. Like the One Plan itself, its the result of a careful process of consultation and consensus-building, and has been approved by the Environment Court. It should be becoming active any time soon. But it won't - because the regime has decide to simply overturn it by legislative fiat to protect its donors and cronies and let them keep on shitting in the river. Twenty years of democratic action and tens of millions of dollars in planning costs and legal fees gone, because one man - Andrew Hoggard - never liked the outcome, and decided to abuse his ministerial position to put his thumb on the scale, outside the normal process.

It's not just the One Plan - Hoggard will also be over-ruling Waikato Regional Council's similarly long-consulted rules to protect the Waikato, outraging Tainui (who view it as undermining their Treaty settlement). Its not just rivers - they're also stomping all over local councils who, after consulting their communities in accordance with the law, decided to use the RMA to regulate inshore fishing to mitigate its destructive effects. And it continues a trend displayed on climate change, transport, Māori representation, of the Beehive arbitrarily overturning court decisions and/or well-consulted local government decisions to impose their own views from above, without consultation or evidence, usually at the behest of some deep-pocketed industry lobby and tens of thousands of dollars in "donations". That's just how this regime operates. Its an affront to democracy, the rule of law, and local decision-making. Instead, we have arrogance, dictatorship and corruption.

This is no way to run a country. Local decision-making should mean exactly that. We can't have our lives micromanaged by Wellington, intruding into our lives and vetoing our decisions at the behest of lobbyists or their own weirdo freak ideology.

We need to overthrow this regime. Vote it out in November, prosecute those responsible for their corrupt practices and ban them from office, and reform the system so that it cannot happen again.

An urgent move to not fix anything

National's corrupt Muldoonist fast-track legislation has a problem: in addition to being corrupt and Muldoonist, it allows developers to buy approval for projects where there isn't the infrastructure to support them. For example, the recently approved Delmore development in Ōrewa, which will require wastewater to be trucked out for the forseeable future, because there's no sewage connection there. Normally councils deal with this sort of problem by charging developers a development contribution to pay for the required infrastructure - something the right absolutely hates. But fast track bypasses all that, with the result that fast-tracked developments are artificially cheap, effectively subsidised by other residents. Which in turn means other areas get starved of their infrastructure or face higher rates to pay for the costs of ministers' special projects.

To their credit, National recognises this inability to make fast track projects pay for their infrastructure is a problem. They consider it so urgent a problem that they plan to fix it with completely out-of-the-blue committee stage amendments to an unrelated local government bill. But - and here's the kicker - they won't actually fix it. According to the Beehive press release,

The amendments will not apply to fast-track developments that have already been approved or where a substantive application has already been lodged with the EPA.

So, its "urgent" enough to "justify" doing further violence to our democratic system - but not urgent enough to actually fix. I guess they wouldn't want their pet developers to feel ripped-off, that they hadn't got their money's worth from their "donations". So we get performative bullshit instead.

Meanwhile, I remember when National thought development contributions held up development and discouraged growth. I'm glad to see they've finally realised that they actually pay for necessary things rather than just being made up by councils to spite the Mighty Lords of Real Estate. I wonder when they'll realise that about taxes?

Climate Change: Overdoing it?

Climate change is here, causing increasingly severe weather. In April, Wellington was flooded by extreme rainfall, making 40 homes uninhabitable and killing one person. Auckland suffered similar floods in 2023. We had more weather-related states of emergency in the first two months of 2026 than in the whole of 2025, and the number has only increased. A severe weather warning affecting multiple regions is issued every two weeks. But weirdly, the minister for climate change and local government thinks councils are doing too much to stop this, and has sent them a shitty letter demanding they pretend its not happening:

Wellington’s mayor has slammed a climate mitigation letter from the local government minister as “tone deaf”, in a city where a man died in flood waters and other residents scrambled for their lives mere weeks ago.

Local Government Minister Simon Watts’ letter to mayors, regional council chairpeople and council chief executives around the country started arriving in in-boxes about 6pm on Tuesday.

In it, he insinuated councils were “gold-plating” climate initiatives and building for worst-case scenarios at ratepayers’ expenses.

[...]

Asked for examples of problem initiatives, Watts’ office highlighted a Greater Wellington Regional Council regional flood hazard assessment, which produced a map showing where is prone to flooding risk. Areas severely flooded in April, such as Emerson St in Berhampore, were identified as being at risk.

The last bit makes it crystal clear why Watts is doing this: because clearly identifying climate change risks means some people's property values will drop. People with houses in flood zones might not be able to insure or sell them, and developers who have hoarded coastal property won't be able to develop it and might lose money. So to protect the imaginary property values of the rich, we all have to ignore what is happening before our eyes and pretend that everything is perfectly normal.

This is, simply, bullshit. And if Watts gets his way, more people will die. But Watts doesn't care. Weirdly, he seems to think none of this bad weather will affect him in any way.

Climate change is an existential threat to future for humanity. The regime has clearly chosen a side in that struggle, and it is the side of polluters and devastation. They have moved from passively not giving a shit to actively trying to stop people from doing anything about it. If we want a future, we need to throw this climate quisling regime out of office, and elect a government which will protect us, rather than protecting polluters.

The opposite of localism

At the 2023 election, National promised "localism", the devolution of power from central to local government. How's that working out? Today, they're demanding local authorities amalgamate or be punished:

The government has given councils an ultimatum: come up with amalgamation plans within three months or the government will do it for you.

Local Government Minister Simon Watts and RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop announced the move on Tuesday afternoon, giving a three-month deadline for reorganisation plans to be delivered.

It followed an announcement in November that groups of city and district mayors - with some government oversight - would be formed to come up with such plans.

But the ministers on Tuesday said if councils failed to make use of the new 'Head Start' approach, they would be forced into changes.

The three-month deadline leaves no chance for public consultation, which is fundamental to local body reorganisations. And of course there's no mention of examination by the Local Government Commission, or referenda to approve any changes. Instead, National seems to think it can do all this by central government fiat.

The amalgamations must be to become "unitary authorities". In other words, its about abolishing regional councils and turning their regulatory functions over to local authorities. So in Palmerston North, it would mean the same people who want to pump shit into the river would be in charge of deciding whether people should be allowed to pump shit into the river - an inherent conflict of interest. It would also mean abolishing our Māori wards (which two-thirds of us voted to retain just last year) - as well as those pesky Ngai Tahu seats that ECan refuses to get rid of. Meanwhile the fixed size of councils would effectively mean reduced representation for everyone, while allowing National to gerrymander disproportionate representation for its rurals. They might also take the opportunity to do away with STV, allowing all local government to be dominated by narrow pluralities via the undemocratic block-vote.

National's August deadline is a clear attempt to pre-empt the election and present the next government with a fait accompli. But councils could just refuse to play along. There's no law saying they have to do this, only Trumpian threats from two regime Ministers. And that seems a weak justification for spending a lot of time and money, especially when there may be a new government in November which will throw it all out the window. Its probably better to just wait and see, rather than waste time and local money on National's bullshit.

National's attempt to dictate the merger of councils, abolish regional government, and reduce local representation is the very opposite of localism. There is an established process for this. Councils can use it if they want to, after consulting their electorates. The fact that so many have chosen not to speaks for itself about what they want.

Public expenses should be public as a matter of course

The cover story of today's Substandard is the forced release of Palmerston North Mayor Grant Smith's credit card expenses. The actual expenses show nothing much - a bunch of work-related travel and hospitality spending, in accordance with policy. Smith travelled for work, attending meetings with Ministers and other significant, job-related events, and so of course his employers - the people of Palmerston North - paid for that, as any normal employer should. The release of the expenses is useful in exposing some of those policies - for example, around alcohol and hospitality - allowing us to update them to meet modern public expectations. But I don't see any real suggestion that Smith has done anything wrong, or spent outrageously or anything like that. There's no reports of huge drunken dinners or lonely late-night porn movies - unlike Shane Jones or Murray McCully.

The real story here is that Hayden Fitzgerald - a cooker and TPU stooge on city council - had to ask in the first place. Because official credit card spending is public money, and it should be proactively released at regular intervals as a matter of course - as happens with Ministers and public sector chief executives (example). Which makes it all the more outrageous when Smith complains about it:

Smith hit back, saying it had cost the council $10,000 to fulfill Fitzgerald's Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act request when his "sensitive expenditure" was already published every three months.

Firstly, the council only had to spend "$10,000" (a suspiciously round number, and unlikely to be true) because they tried to hide this information, rather than publishing it regularly like they should. Secondly, the claim that the existing reports (example on p113 - 116) are remotely useful is laughable. Like "reporting" on MPs' expenses, they are a category summary only, with no information on what, when, or why, and so allowing no analysis of whether particular spending was reasonable and necessary. That doesn't mean it wasn't - again, from the reporting, there's no real suggestion the spending was inappropriate - but if public bodies want to enjoy public trust, they need to earn it. And the way to do that is to be open and transparent. Which means that PNCC should respond to this by immediately moving to a proactive release model for all mayoral and councillor official expenditure.

Finally, I guess the other story here is that this request was made by Hayden Fitzgerald, a city councillor, rather than the Substandard themselves. Ministerial expenses have been public for 17 years, and I'd have thought that mayoral expenses would just be a regular part of the local government beat by now. You're really earning that nickname there, guys!

There is a name for this

The Auditor-General has tabled their report on former MP Paul Eagle's spending while chief executive of the Chatham islands Council, and its not good, exposing serious management and integrity issues at the Council. Including this:

Auditor-General Grant Taylor and Assistant Auditor-General Melanie Webb said a project to refurbish the home which housed the council's chief executive was not well managed, and changes Eagle requested "increased the costs beyond what was necessary".

Quotes and contracts for the work on the property were found to have been created or edited by Eagle, as well as procurement memorandums created by him in 2025 had been backdated to the previous year.

[...]

"The information that the chief executive provided was misleading. Specifically, it created an incorrect picture about when certain events occurred (for example, when a contract was signed) or whether they had happened at all.

They decline to give a position on the legality of Eagle's actions, but there are a number of names for it: corruption. Fraud. More specifically, forgery, altering documents with intent to deceive, and using altered documents with intent to deceive. These are serious crimes, and Eagle needs to be prosecuted for them. When a person in power abuses their position to enrich or advantage themselves, then that is corruption, and they need to be held to account.

Climate Change: The sin of cheapness

Tairāwhiti has a problem. Thanks to decades of forestry strip-mining the land, every major storm washes down sediment and slash from the hills, covering fields and smashing bridges. And as we saw last month, major storms are happening more often and getting worse...

Tairāwhiti also has a solution: a transition programme agreed with farmers, foresters, environmental groups and the wider community, which would see the hills replanted with native trees to prevent erosion. But to do it, they need government funding: $359 million over a decade - $36 million a year - which will be matched by $241 million from the community. And it should be a no-brainer, because the damage it averts is estimated at at least four times that much. In 2023 the damage from flooding was a billion dollars alone...

But of course, the government said "no". It turns out they have infinite money for landlords, for tax cuts to the rich, for -ve BCR roads in Auckland, or for war-toys - but nothing for actually protecting people from real risks, even when it is profitable to do so.

Its stupid. It's short-sighted. And its simple cheapness. The government just... doesn't want to pay. But if they won't, then its worth asking the question: if the government won't pay to protect people from real risks, why do we even fucking have it? What is it for? And if the answer to that is just "giving more money to rich people and Shame Jones' corrupt mates", then maybe its time we did away with this bunch and got a new one?

Overturning local democracy

A month ago we had local body elections in this country. As part of that, we elected new members to each of the country's eleven regional councils. Five regions also held referenda on Māori wards, with two voting to retain them.

But apparently we wasted our time with all that campaigning and voting, because National is just going to overturn the elections and smash the lot of them:

The Government is set to announce local government reforms that could spell the death of regional councils, it is understood.

Multiple well-placed sources have confirmed reforms being announced on Tuesday will mean the dissolving of regional councils.

It is understood the first steps could be within this current three-year council term with talk of a panel of regional mayors taking over the running of regional councils. This would be the first steps towards removing the councils all together, it is understood.

And of course it will likely be done under urgency, because National doesn't do consultation or democracy any more.

To do this so soon after elections displays a complete contempt for the democratic process, and invites suspicion that National just didn't like the results. Though the alternative - that National just made us all vote knowing we were wasting our time and didn't tell us isn't exactly great either. As for temporarily installing panels of regional mayors in the place of properly elected representatives, this effectively silences the cities and ensures rural over-representation, allowing these unelected bodies to make environmental decisions while ignoring the wishes of their local populations. Which is exactly what they did to ECan in 2010. And the result was giving Canterbury's water to farmers and letting them intensify and pollute with abandon - with consequences we are still suffering from.

Overturning elections and removing democratic representation in order to advance the interests of cronies and donors is the act of a corrupt and undemocratic tyranny. We should not accept it, or the regime which does it. So its something else to be reverted in the Omnibus Repeal Bill.

Trumpism in Kaipara

Kaipara Mayor Craig Jepson is known as the "Trump of the North" due to his racism and authoritarianism. And now he seems to be mirroring his idol's contempt for democracy, calling an emergency meeting of the Kaipara District Council in an effort to overturn the election results:

Craig Jepson, the outgoing mayor of Kaipara, has called an emergency meeting for Thursday evening challenging the results of the district and regional council elections.

Jepson had endorsed his deputy Jonathan Larsen to succeed him, but on the preliminary vote Larsen is just five votes ahead of challenger Snow Tane. And Newsroom has been told that Tane is set to overhaul him, when election officials announce the special votes tomorrow.

Councillor Pera Paniora, whose Māori ward seat will be disestablished from Friday, says many older Māori and other voters had cast special votes for Tane.

They were dismayed at moves by Jepson and Larsen like banning karakia at council meetings, and disestablishing the Māori ward, she says.

The Local Electoral Act includes provisions allowing candidates or electors to apply for a recount or challenge election results. None of them require a council meeting. Jepson is either attempting to bypass them (and try and illegally direct the local electoral officer to apply instead, and prevent results from being published), or they are trying to get the council to spend public money to support the appeal of his favoured candidate. Neither is acceptable.

Jepson claims there was misconduct in the election (signage for a different election which may not be illegal and which he thinks may have affected Kaipara's). If so that question can be determined by a judge. But in the meantime, he just looks like an outgoing mayor trying to use the council to put his thumb on the scale and overturn a vote rather than accept the will of the people.

Palmerston North keeps the cookers out!

Local body election results were announced on Saturday, and it seems that Palmerston North has kept the cookers out! Mayor grant Smith was handily re-elected, and while progress results showed the Greens' Kaydee Zabelin losing her council seat to Labour's Zulfiqar Butt, the preliminary results (which included Saturday-morning voters) reversed that. Of course, it could change again in the final results as preferences shift on the specials, but its a good place to be in. Meanwhile, no outright cookers were elected (though cooker queen Jackie Wheeler is next in line and could still get in on special votes). But the council has shifted slightly right, with retiring leftish councillor Patrick Handcock replaced by keep rates low loonie Hayden Fitzgerald.

On Māori wards, its also good news, with Palmerston North voting decisively to say "fuck you" to the regime and keep its Māori ward. Horizons was looking like a failure on the progress results, but the preliminaries have reversed that, with "keep" now enjoying a 120 vote lead. So its going to come down to the special votes, due out at the end of the week.

Who to vote for in Palmerston North 2

Palmerston North held a mayoral candidate debate last night, and based on the Substandard's writeup, I've finally figured out how I'm ranking the candidates.

My first preference goes to Michael Morris, who's big pitch was being vegan. He's also the only candidate to fully back the Featherston Street remodelling, saying that "if the city was serious about sustainability, health and inclusivity it had to look beyond giving priority to people driving motor cars." He's also Green-affiliated, so that puts him to the top.

Number two is incumbent Grant Smith, who has been a pretty good mayor, and (from once being a Nat IIRC) now describes himself as "centre-right with a green tinge" (which is accurate, given his record). Both he and Mickalad had second-thoughts about the design of Featherston Street, but not the goal, which is not a terrible position to take.

Number three is Orphée Mickalad, who played up his National Party affiliations (so fuck him), and whose main pitch just seemed to be "a new face".

Not preferenced: Caleb Riddick, whose answers were all danger-signs: rabidly anti-Featherston Street, self-described "independent", no real platform. I'm not saying that he's a cooker - but from his statements and the complete lack of public information about him, I can't rule it out either. And that's enough to chuck him in the bin.

So, I've now finally filled out my form, and its just a matter of finding a big orange bin to dump it in.

Who to vote for in Palmerston North (2025)

My local body voting papers arrived earlier in the week, so its time for the usual post in which I try and work out who I'm voting for. This year in addition to my usual policy interests of climate change, public transport, decent services (which must be paid for), and wanting a council that looks like Aotearoa, I'm doing an outright litmus test on Māori wards: supporters in, opponents out. I'm also worried about the quiet campaign of stealth cooker candidates seeking to infiltrate, subvert, and undermine local government. Sadly the media seems to have stopped paying attention to this, and there hasn't been any concentrated coverage or big exposes like last time, so I've had to try and spot the cookers myself. I've also been using the Progress Report to see what there is about the candidates; unfortunately policy.nz hasn't been very useful to me this time (it may be useful to you?). Where does that leave me? Read on...

Referendums

If it wasn't clear enough, I will be voting to retain Māori wards at both local and regional level, because fuck this racist anti-Māori regime. Also, the endless parade of local body figures - including lots of boring old white conservatives - saying simply "they work" or even defending them on economic grounds, ought to convince everyone that the government has made a very bad decision here.

Mayor

There are four candidates this time, all of which seem fairly normal. All of them support Māori wards, and all of them seem to be on roughly the same page (so far) regarding climate change and public transport - though there's a mayoral debate next week, so maybe some policy differences will arise then. Until then I'm mostly going on vibes, and those are that the incumbent, Grant Smith, is pretty good. That said, I like Orphée Mickalad, and normally I'd preference him ahead of Smith on demographic grounds (young before old etc...), if not for the fact that he talks about "faith" in his blurb (which is usually a sign of being a bigot or a weirdo or both), and he supported the regime tolling the existing state highway connection to Hawkes' Bay (which I don't use, but still... fuck that shit). Michael Morris's big pitch is that he's a vegan, which doesn't seem to have much relevance to local government, but I'm tempted to rank him first on environmental grounds (STV, so it doesn't hurt). There is no information about Caleb Riddick, none whatsoever. He might be a great candidate (and again, would normally rank highly on demographic grounds) - but there's just nothing, other than support for Māori wards. In the current environment that's a danger sign, so unless something pops up in the debate next week, he's probably not even getting preferenced.

City Council This is a big decision-space: 37 candidates for 13 spaces in the Te Hirawanui general ward. So its mostly an exercise in winnowing the field. Fortunately some of it is easy: there are two Green and two Labour candidates, who will get the top spots, and the incumbents are known quantities who generally support Māori wards as well (with a couple of notable exceptions), and some of them can be safely given a lower preference. There are also people who are easy to rule out, starting the ACT candidate (fuck them), anyone who has signed the Taxpayers Onion pledge, anyone who says "keep rates low" (or equivalent), anyone ranting about Featherston Street and cycleways, and cookers. On the latter front, Jackie Wheeler submitted against the pandemic response (and explicitly endorsed Voices For Freedom to boot); she also founded the local angry "residents" group, which is a VFF front (so, no preference for anyone they endorse). Quintin McGregor also submitted in favour of the virus, spewing cooker tropes. Mel Butler ran last time and I'd marked her as an anti-vaxer then. Dave Poppelwell is a former New Conservative candidate. Zakk Rokkanno smells like a cooker as well, talking about being "not easily led" and "think[ing] for myself" (last time it was an explicit promise to Do His Own Research), but his concern about "cancel culture" is still a screaming red flag - what are you afraid of being "cancelled" over, Zakk?

"Back to basics" seems to be the local cooker passphrase, and so anyone with that in their blurb (Dunlop, Hoskins, Salisbury) can be ruled out.

Incumbents who can be ruled out: Hapeta and Wood (Nats, oppose Māori wards), Arnott (pro-car), Findlay, Meehan, and Naylor (keep rates low). I'd also rule out Michael Strachan, simply because he seems to have no idea what local government actually does (its not about mental health and education), and because he talks about "faith" (weirdo!). Verne Wilson is just a Business Daddy, so he can fuck off.

So who does that leave who might get a preference after my top four (Zabelin, Barrett, Butt, Johnson) and safe incumbents (Bowen, Dennison)? Nelson Harper is involved in Just Zilch (a local food rescue charity; a good sign), and a self-described greenie. He's been critical of Featherston Street, but approaches it from a place of not being sure it was the best design, rather than "rarr! bike lanes!". Worth a preference I think. Cameron Jenkins is from the Manawatu Tenants Union, and a queer community advocate. Richard Woolgar is a water engineer, seems pretty sensible, supports Māori wards, and might be OK.

People I'm not sure about: Tobias Nash (an OK blurb, and he's been trolling the cookers and the TPU, but I'm just not sure OK, seen some endorsements of him as smart and progressive, so I'll bump him up to giving him a preference), Eldhose Poovathumveettil Mathew (good blurb, but mentions reducing rates while promising more services), Adrian Phillips (pro-rail, pro-Māori wards, but talking about political "independence" just smalls bad), Atif Rahim (pro 3 waters last time, but also says "sensible spending"), and of course Caleb Riddick (again: nothing to judge on but the blurb, which isn't enough). These might get a preference if I have any left.

The Māori ward candidates all look quite good, but I'm not on that roll.

Horizons

Lots of choice this year - ten candidates for four positions. And a recent debate showed most candidates to be on the same page on the issues I care about. The exception being Peter Wells, who I'd rule out just on his "affordable rates" tag anyway. I also have a long-standing hate against corrupt former mayor Jono Naylor, even if he spoke up strongly for Māori wards and is largely in the right place on everything else.

Horizons still uses the archaic and undemocratic bloc-vote system, so I need to be more careful than I would under STV. I'll happily give a tick to incumbents Wiremu Te Awe Awe and Fiona Gordon, and to Green candidate Emma Gregg. as for my fourth vote, it'll probably go to Daniel Fordyce (the Just Zilch seal of approval again!), or to Manu Karki. I'd rule out Charles George purely on demographics (and because he talks about being "independent" again - should this be an official red flag?), but nothing seems particularly wrong with the other two.

Voting closes at noon on Saturday, 11 October, so I have a bit of time to refine my choices. Because of the general unreliability of NZ Post these days, I'll be dropping my vote in one of the big orange boxes around town, rather than trusting the postal system. Fortunately there's one at every library, supermarket, and a bunch of other places as well, so it ought to be easy.

Update (11/09/2025): added comments about Tobias Nash; I'm bumping him up from "not sure" to "preference".

Maybe Little should actually win the election first?

So, Andrew Little thinks the Wellington City Council should cancel its plans for the Golden Mile, because there's an election in five months:

Andrew Little told Nine to Noon he'd be disappointed to see the council march ahead with the plan, given local body elections are to be held in October.

[...]

He said he'd repeat his message to the council - asking them to pause on signing more work contracts for the Golden Mile.

"Given that there is going to be a change of mayor after 11 October - and there'll be a new line-up in council - I don't think it's ethically correct for this council to be signing off significant new contracts that will bind the next council at a time when things are so sensitive for the Wellington economy."

...which is assuming a whole lot, not the least that Little will be elected as mayor, and that the future council will be as anti-redevelopment as he is. Meanwhile, the actually existing council were elected to serve a three-year term, which won't end for five months, have consulted repeatedly on this project, and many of them were elected on a platform of doing it. But apparently all of that counts for nothing against the whims of an unelected dude who feels entitled to power.

There's an obvious comparison here with US Republicans who refused to allow Merrick Garland's nomination to the Supreme Court, on the basis that their dude - Trump - would win the next election. And its as ugly and entitled and undemocratic from Little as it was from them

But then, ugly and entitled is Little's campaign to a t, starting from the moment he shoved Tory Whanau aside. The problem is that he needs Whanau's progressive urbanist pro-Golden Mile project voters to win. And if they correctly conclude that he is offering them nothing, and don't turn out for or second-preference him, and he loses, he will have no-one but himself to blame.

Shoving the future aside

I woke this morning to the shock news that Tory Whanau was no longer contesting the Wellington mayoralty, having stepped aside to leave the field clear for Andrew Little. Its like a perverse reversal of Little's 2017 decision to step aside for Jacinda - the stale, pale past rudely shoving the voice of the future aside.

This isn't any criticism of Whanau - she has to do what's right for her, and she's been very gracious about it (even effectively endorsing Little). But there's a real question of whether her progressive urbanist voters will stomach supporting another Labour failure, especially when his immediate response is to double down on the Keep Rates Low bullshit which has ruined Wellington in the first place:

The former Labour leader said one of the main reasons he stepped up to be a candidate was so he could restore the faith in the council.

“There, there’s not, it is simply not acceptable for rates to increase, by my calculation, about 30% in the last two years,” Little said.

“A lot of that is, I think, council not getting a grip on their own finances.”

Nope. Its because politicians like Little Kept Rates Low and didn't pay to maintain the infrastructure which literally underlies their city, instead choosing to kick the can - or rather, the giant puddle of shit - down the road. Now that bill has come due, the council is actually facing up to it, and the wealthy wankers in their drafty "heritage" villas want to just keep on not paying, because they'll be dead soon. Last election Wellington voters told those people to go fuck themselves, by electing Whanau and a progressive council. The question is, when the only mayoral choice on offer is "Keep Rates Low" wearing different-coloured ties, whether they'll even bother to turn up this time.

Little's pitch

So, having teased it last week, Andrew Little has announced he will run for mayor of Wellington. On RNZ, he's saying its all about services - "fixing the pipes, making public transport cheaper, investing in parks, swimming pools and libraries, and developing more housing". Meanwhile, to the readers of the reactionary Post, he's making a rather different pitch:

Little, who is working as a lawyer after serving as an MP for 12 years, said his priorities in office would be fiscal responsibility, affordable housing and better project management, such as reconsidering the controversial Golden Mile project.

[...]

As mayor, he would pursue a regional deal to build new infrastructure, put an end to front-loading costs on ratepayers, and run a ruler over-spending.

"Fiscal responsibility", "an end to front-loading costs on ratepayers", "run a ruler over-spending" - yes, it's the same "Keep Rates Low" platform which is responsible for the underinvestment in infrastructure which has seen perpetually leaky pipes and shit on the streets. With a side order of empty promises of "better management" and some wishful thinking about getting someone else to pay for it all. Oh, and some "questions" about cycleways and urbanism, just to ensure wealthy urban-villa-owners and ute-drivers are on-side. And that's apparently what Labour stands for now: the classic stale, pale, male agenda which has wrecked local government in Aotearoa. The last gasp of the greedy generation which looted everything while stealing from the future.

The good news is that Wellington has STV, so Little running won't split the vote and allow some right-wing, Keep Rates Low candidate to win. But we may get one under Labour colours instead. Vote accordingly.

Stomping on democracy

That's the only way to describe National's actions in appointing a crown observer to the Wellington City Council. Wellington didn't vote for National. They elected a council which supports public transport, housing intensification, and making Wellington a nicer place for people to live (rather than landlords and house hoarders to bank capital gains). So they've started the process to overthrow that council, using the disruption created by National's own proxies on the council as a justification. Which sounds an awful lot like Putin's tactics of using "instability" caused by local proxies to justify invasion...

But its not just Wellington. The Otago Regional Council is trying to pass a land and water plan which will protect its rivers. The government has just decided to legislate to stop them from doing so - and of course it will have retrospective effect (a favourite tactic of this government). In Auckland, they're trying to over-rule the Auckland Council's commitment to safe speed limits, so they can hoon to the airport in their government limos. In Canterbury they seem to be gearing up to overthrow local democracy to steal the water again. And then there's all those councils who want to keep their Māori wards...

it seems that rather than being committed to localism, National wants to micromanage our councils from Wellington. And if voters disagree, well, they'll just stop us from voting. Which probably sounds fine to them - except (so far) we can still vote in 2026, and we should take the opportunity to vote these anti-democratic authoritarian tyrants out on their arses.

Councils reject racism

Last month, National passed a racist law requiring local councils to remove their Māori wards, or hold a referendum on them at the 2025 local body election. The final councils voted today, and the verdict is in: an overwhelming rejection. Only two councils out of 45 supported National's racist agenda of immediate disestablishment. The rest basically told central government to go fuck itself. Some of them even wanted to say so explicitly. And many have directed their council bureaucracies to explore the option of just not having the required referendum - effectively threatening outright rebellion.

And the reason for this is simple: Māori wards work. In meeting after meeting, councillors stood up to say so, that the permanent presence of Māori representatives was a vital part of democracy which ensured the whole community was represented, gave them a useful perspective and valuable input and stopped them making mistakes. And in meeting after meeting, it was local National Party representatives saying this. Which tells you how off-side National's racist policy has put it with its own base.

So, in October next year, people in 43 council areas covering most of Te Ika-a-Māui will effectively be having a referendum on the National government. Which ought to make them decidedly uncomfortable. National can of course avoid this by repealing its racist legislation. If they don't, then here's hoping for a bloody defeat at the polls next year.

Councils reject National's racism

Last month, National passed a racist law requiring local councils to remove their Māori wards, or hold a referendum on them at the 2025 local body election. The government was clearly hoping that, despite all their prior opposition, local authorities would bow down, obey, and vote to disenfranchise Māori. But instead the opposite has occured. I've been tracking this out of curiosity, and so far 24 councils have voted to retain their wards, and only two have voted to remove them. Twenty councils are still undecided, so already a majority of councils have rejected National's racist policy. A surprising number of councils have also voted to explore the option of just ignoring the law, and not having a referendum, which says something about the depth of opposition.

Its also worth noting that its not big cities voting to retain - Wellington, Hamilton, Tauranga and Porirua are yet to formally decide on the issue. Instead, the opposition is from provincial and rural councils - National's base. In Palmerston North, the mayor and all National councillors opposed the government. In the Manawatū-Whanganui Regional Council, the most vocal opponent was Jono Naylor, a former National MP. And the reason for this is simple: like the Māori seats, Māori wards work, and once they exist, everyone can see it. Which is I suspect what racist National was afraid of.

So now it looks like the 2025 local body elections are shaping up to be a nationwide referendum on this racist government. And while we can't vote them out directly, we could send a useful message which might change their direction and shape the narrative for the 2026 election. So next year, more than ever, you should pay attention to that local body elections envelope which shows up in your mailbox - and vote "fuck you" to the government.

Palmerston North supports Māori wards

The Palmerston North City Council voted this morning on the future of our Māori ward - and voted unanimously to retain it, and have a referendum at the 2025 local body election. They also voted to investigate the option of not having a referendum - that is, directly challenging the government.

This is a provincial council. Its mayor is a Nat. There are open Nats on the council. All of them spoke against the government's agenda, in quite strong terms. And all of them voted for the final motion. It seems that National's programme of enforced, top-down racism isn't even popular with their own party.