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Andrew Dickens: The government has given the councils a telling off for Christmas · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

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  Speaker 1: Drop the well beings. The government has given the councils
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  Speaker 1: a tongue lash for Christmas, and they're going to hold
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  Speaker 1: councilors accountable for the basics like pipes and rubbish. But
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  Speaker 1: whatever you do do not mention well being. But I
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  Speaker 1: don't know about you. The care and maintenance of pipes
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  Speaker 1: and sewage and all that sort of thing is pretty
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  Speaker 1: fundamental to my well being. Water pooh, fundamental to the
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  Speaker 1: health of society and well being anyway. Minister Simeon Brown
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  Speaker 1: now wants a report issued each year on the financial
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  Speaker 1: health of each council they're spending and their results. He
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  Speaker 1: wants to compare them all together. They also want to
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  Speaker 1: look at changes and rates for each dwelling. In other words,
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  Speaker 1: the government's going to read the publicly listed council reports
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  Speaker 1: and produce their own report because apparently many rate payers
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  Speaker 1: don't or can't be bothered reading what the councilor has said. Anyway,
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  Speaker 1: it's not as though it's hidden. It's also the job
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  Speaker 1: the media used to do until we got so skinned
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  Speaker 1: we don't have the staff to turn up to actually
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  Speaker 1: report on it. Remember that each time you like the
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  Speaker 1: media sort of being chopped down a little bit. We
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  Speaker 1: need we need people to report on stuff. I couldn't
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  Speaker 1: help thinking the whole thing was a bit of a
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  Speaker 1: dramatic production just before Christmas. Christmas panto here Ryan, he said,
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  Speaker 1: was it bluster? Maybe part of a bit of a
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  Speaker 1: war to paint local bodies as a villain for committing
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  Speaker 1: exactly the same crimes that central government are guilty of.
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  Speaker 1: You know this criticism of council red tape and building consents,
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  Speaker 1: and yet the irony is that it's central government who
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  Speaker 1: writes the rules that the councils are merely enforcing. There's
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  Speaker 1: criticism of a lack of long term plans from councils
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  Speaker 1: when central government tends to change its plans every three
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  Speaker 1: years in line with elections. Central government has been palmed
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  Speaker 1: off with some of the biggest and hardest part of
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  Speaker 1: civil maintenance to their councils. They've got the water, the pool,
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  Speaker 1: the rubbish. And then of course central government has crippled
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  Speaker 1: counsels by and allowing them to only make revenue through
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  Speaker 1: property taxes, and then when things go wrong, treat local
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  Speaker 1: government like a whipping boy. I think the point of
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  Speaker 1: the government's attack on councils is to make them more
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  Speaker 1: accountable to ratepayers, yes one, but possibly to voters from
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  Speaker 1: looking at central government, and thank you for that. Councils
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  Speaker 1: are accountable to ratepayers. It's called the vote, and ratepayers
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  Speaker 1: are notorious for not bothering to use it anyway. Bring
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  Speaker 1: it on. I support the most of it. I love
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  Speaker 1: the report, I love the ratings, I love the comparisons.
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  Speaker 1: Councils should not be afraid of being held to account
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  Speaker 1: because they must believe they're making their towns better, and
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  Speaker 1: I believe on the whole they are. They're doing a
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  Speaker 1: pretty good job. On the smell of an oily rag.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge. Listen live
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: to News Talks it Be from five am weekdays, or
• 2:36
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