Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Hilary Calvert: Otago Regional Council Chair on the Government's proposal to scrap regional councils

Transcript

Hilary Calvert: Otago Regional Council Chair on the Government's proposal to scrap regional councils · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So government wants to cull all eleven regional councils across
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: the country. Instead, their consenting powers will be given to
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: the city and district mayors, who will form another form
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: of council to make region wide decisions. Hillary Calvert's Otaga
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Regional Council chare with me this morning, haud be out
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: of a job if these went through Hillary, Good morning,
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: Good morning thoughts.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: Yes, it's sort of been a while coming regional councils,
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: and that the feeling that there's perhaps one too many
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: layers of decisions and activity and local government in New Zealand,
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: I think and.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: You agree with that, you'd be happy to be out
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: of a job.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: Yes, I am probably one of the one of the
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: turkeys who would organize Christmas. Not not because I would
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: like to be out of a job, because I've just
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: got into it and having been chosen as year by
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: my fellow counselors. It is a bit sad the thought
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: that I can't continue to do that, but for the
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: sake of the Otago Region people and the ratepayers. I
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: can see where the government's coming from.
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: How many staff work at the Otago Regional Council.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: Are I think three hundred and sixty eight to something. Wow,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: so there's twice as many as there was six years.
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: Ago and are doing yeah, well, a lot of planning
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: and that's probably an area that the government is particularly
• 1:46
  Speaker 3: focused on because of what the awkwardness about planning is
• 1:51
  Speaker 3: that the government makes rules like here's what water should
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: be like, and you should go and make a plan
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: about how are you going to do that? And then
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: we go and make a plan about the water and
• 2:06
  Speaker 3: that it's done every five years or whatever it's done,
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: and in it the people below us, the territorial authorities,
• 2:14
  Speaker 3: then they make plans to carry out what we tell
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: them to do. And that also is a plan that
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: might be five yearly and it might have been two
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: years after the plan that we've made and so and
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: there's another one below that. So the government it's all
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: out of step and it doesn't produce good, good results
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: really because it hasn't got a clear pathway because.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: Everyone's just sitting around writing plans out of date ones
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: at that. Hillary, appreciate your time this morning, Hillary Calbot
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: Otago Regional Council Chair. For more from early edition with
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: Ryan Bridge, listen live to news Talks It be from
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: five am weekdays, or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.