I’m usually not interested in local government. In 2019, I didn’t even know the majority of the names I put my preferences to when I filled out the ballot. My votes were based on whether or not I had heard of the person before and whether or not they were a Labour-backed candidate.
Of course it was with some interest that I watched the ‘youth quake’ that happened in those elections when students successfully campaigned to get a seat on our council. During the campaigning that happened before this I attended a National Party meeting around 2018 where a punter raised the issue of the centre-left domination of our council and asked about the possibility of a centre-right local body ticket being formed. It was in response to this question that we received the news of the formation of the Wellington Party.
So what makes this local government election more interesting? Is it the contentious issue of Three Waters and Maori gaining 50 per cent control of our water? Is it the Maori voting laws currently being rushed through? Is it the mask and vaccine mandates imposed on council properties? Or is the fact that people are sick to death of the political class controlling our municipal government and that ordinary people are willing to stand for council.
Originally, I was going to write an article challenging people to do something if they don’t like the woke councils. But I have begun to notice more and more people standing for local government who are far from the activists and ideologues I was used to.
These are some of the candidates that have interested me so far. With council elections not too far away, I thought I would start with some of the mayoral candidates. At some later point I may take a look into local body candidates.
Auckland Mayoral Race
- Viv Beck – Advocating for more police and more support for businesses
- Craig Lord – Standing for mayor to ‘fight the culture war’
- Leo Molloy – Standing for mayor against ‘woke white wingeing’ and on ‘good old common sense’.
Platforms they share:
- Stop increase in rates
- Stop wasteful spending
- More investment into police and infrastructure
- Support businesses
- Opposition to the regional fuel tax
- Decrease road congestion.
Wellington Mayoral Race
- Barbara McKenzie – Standing against Significant Natural Areas
- Rayward Chung – Standing against the Draft Spatial Plan and spending more on infrastructure.
I would not be surprised if we see more mayoral and local body candidates standing on these things:
- Stop increases in rates
- Opposition to Three Waters
- Opposition to Maori wards
- Opposition to wasteful council projects like the Skypath and various ‘art’ projects.
I suspect a goodly number of candidates to come from the Groundswell movement, particularly in the provinces, and a good number of freedom fighters to stand for urban councils against council discrimination of the unvaxxed and unmasked.
Of course the two biggest challenges for these brave people is a council that will use bylaws to impede their campaign and a mainstream media who will attack them at every turn.
The point of local government was to discuss and make rulings on local issues. The central government can only do so much with limited terms and taxes: they have to focus on issues such as defence, health and trade. That is why it is up to local councils to focus on infrastructure, roading, parks and building. Local councils were representatives of local communities. This allowed slight differences in the way areas were governed and maintained while still following the law of the land. It also reflected the variety of communities, each representing a specific section of society with their own ideas and way of life.
Traditionally the people who were voted in were part of the community they represented. However, in the past year we appear to have ideologues who represent interests outside of the local communities, which does put into question our local government voting laws and whether or not you can vote for a council because you happen to move into that area and become a resident. It also represents the effects of globalisation and how the world has become much bigger. Councils were created because the only world that people knew was that of their city or town, and therefore that view is what the councils represented. But we no longer have that type of separation. This has allowed people who focus more on the global community, rather than the local community, to get voted in. This is perhaps why our councils of late focus on international issues and promote a global view rather than a local view. Unfortunately in their pursuit of these global issues they have abandoned the local issues. One reason may be their ability to make these global issues relevant to the local communities they claim to serve.
Local government also separated powers and acted as a check against majority rule for local communities. It limited the power of the central government and stopped them making decisions to the detriment of a particular area. It also provided a platform for a town or city to voice their concerns to political decisions and policies coming out of Wellington. That is why, traditionally, local politicians had no party affiliations and why local body tickets were independent. This has changed with the professionalisation of our local politics and political parties creeping into the council. As has been pointed out by other commentators, this restricts the ability for councillors to hold the government accountable if they happen to be a member of the ruling party.
But the candidates I mentioned represent a backlash against these global ideologies, partly as a response to the increasing technocracy that we are seeing in our local government. The Climate Change Steering Committee is a good example of this. These candidates focus on local issues and hope to return our local government to its core mission of representing the town or city against the majority and holding the central government to account. These candidates are normal everyday people standing up for their communities, contrary to the professional activists we’ve had. They come with a professional business or work background, instead of academia, suggesting a populist rise in local government. I look forward to seeing what happens in the coming months.