Picture a councillor about to vote on whether her council should sell its shares in the local airport. Management tells her that voting one way could expose the council to legal risk. 
 
She asks to see the legal advice behind that warning, which her council commissioned and ratepayers paid for. She is refused.
 
According to MP Stuart Smith, this actually happened at Wellington City Council. He opened the first-reading debate on his Local Government (Management of Local Authorities) Amendment Bill with the example.
 
This week I lodged the Initiative’s submission supporting the Bill.
 
The current problem is that elected members are accountable for what their councils do but the Local Government Act does not expressly make council management subject to their direction and supervision.
 
Too often, information is withheld from councillors on the grounds that it is 'operational’ or ‘commercially sensitive’.  Alternatively, it is buried in dense reports with inadequate time for digestion and discussion. Absurdly, councillors around the country have resorted to official information requests to prise information from their own councils.
 
The Bill would make it clear that the chief executive is subject to direction and supervision of the elected council. It would also allow councillors to seek advice from outside their own bureaucracy.
 
These are hardly radical ideas. A company board, school board or charitable trust would take them for granted.
 
The Initiative’s submission supports the Bill while proposing amendments to make sure it has effect in practice.
 
While elected members should govern the council, decisions on individual consents and enforcement should remain with independent decisionmakers. The ability to commission external advice should be subject to a policy and a budget so it is not treated as a blank cheque. Mechanisms are also needed for when councillor information requests are declined (in full or in part) or are not responded to in a timely manner.
 
The Bill has received broad political support. It should be a first step towards giving elected representatives greater ability to govern their councils and represent their communities effectively.
 
Local election turnout last year was a miserable 39 percent. A system in which the people you elect cannot get straight answers from the organisations they supposedly govern gives voters one more reason to stay home.
 
The Initiative’s submission on the Local Government (Management of Local Authorities) Amendment Bill can be found here.

One of the most important things teachers can do to help their students improve is to give them feedback on their work. To be effective, feedback must be timely and specific.

As the election campaign gathers pace, it is timely to give the political parties some feedback on their policies. They certainly need improvement.

Labour, you got off to a slow start this year. Frankly, you’ve been coasting. You’ve finally discovered some motivation but your work remains sloppy. 

Your proposed capital gains tax would be a tax on inflation. This has been explained to you before and I think you understand it, but you have resisted making the necessary revisions.

New Zealand First, I get that your voters like you banging the anti-immigrant drum. But your proposal to take National Super away from non-citizen residents who have paid tax in New Zealand for decades just makes you look like a bully.

Focus on whether New Zealand’s immigration settings provide value to the economy. I know you think all that economics stuff is boring, but sometimes you just have to knuckle down.

ACT, you promised to abolish the Permanent Resident visa category. Later you at least made an exemption for existing residents and incoming investors.

This work bears the hallmarks of homework started five minutes before the deadline. In other areas your work has been more diligent, but next time, please try to think before you write.

Greens, no one can doubt your good intentions. And I understand your impulse to hang with the cool kids. But just because the Mayor of New York wants to run supermarkets doesn’t make it a good idea.

Before most of you were born there was a place called the Soviet Union where the state owned all the supermarkets. People had to queue to buy bread. Try to concentrate during history lessons.

On the subject of supermarkets, National, I despair of you. Despite some solid work on education, you’ve spent far too much time squabbling with your mates.

And now you want to forcibly split up a major supermarket company? The Greens at least have the excuse of being young and naïve. You are supposed to be the mature one.

Most of you will be back in Parliament next year, although few of you deserve to be. On the other hand, based on your work this year, you’d struggle to find jobs anywhere else.