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11:01 am, October 12th, 2025 - 49 comments
Categories: auckland supercity, community democracy, democracy under attack, local body elections, local government, supercity -
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These are a few random comments as I start to work out what happened in the latest Local Government election.
First up turnout was appalling. It was predicted that the dumbing down of the mail system and the increasing proportion of the population who do not use mail would mean that turnout would plunge. And so it did.
In Auckland the reported turnout is 24.2% compared to 35.5% last time. There are still late and special votes to count but the estimate is that these are only 10% to 20% to count. So the result may get up to 30% but this is anemic.
As a comparison Wellington’s turnout is also down at 37.9% but not my much.
My view is that the lack of a contested mayoral campaign contributed significantly to this. Kerrin Leoni in my view put up a spirited fight but Labour’s failure to endorse or support her meant that she struggeled with resources and support.
The decision to effectively back Wayne Brown really had me scratching my head. He is no friend of the left. He championed the sale of the Airport shares and tried to sell Ports of Auckland. And his treatment of women is less than stellar.
In the future Labour has to ensure that there is a progressive candidate and that they are properly resourced.
Auckland Council remains finely balanced. Sarah Paterson-Hamlin thankfully bet Craig Lord in the Whau ward to replace Leoni. Elsewhere the right gained one Council seat in Manurewa.
Local Boards remained similar although in Otara Papatoetoe (Papatoetoe subdivision) Labour lost ground. The turnout was 27.4% which seems high especially considering that the turnout in the neighbouring Otara subdivion was 17.8%.
Elsewhere there was something of a rout of mayors with 31 Mayors losing their positions and two others in the balance. Jonathan Milne has suggested that this is evidence of a swing to the right and puts the reason down as
I have not seen any analysis and this should obviously wait for the final results but I suspect there is a correlation between Councils that opposed Three Waters and large rates increases and deposed mayors.
The various referenda about Maori wards obviously also energised those with grievances to vote. Over half of the Maori wards will be gone at the next election. I was pleased to see more urban areas voted to retain their wards.
Overall there needs to be a rethink about Local Government. It is a shame that the Government shelved the previous review into the Future of Local Government. The report analysed the issues in detail and provided comments that could have made a great deal of difference.
The next three years will be important for Local Government. If the Government does not handle reform correctly then Local Government may be damaged beyond repair.
The other factor at play is the number of local boards with ‘have a go candidates’, like west Auckland which had nearly 20 which splits the vote. So minor known names get re-elected with a ridiculously low number of votes – less than 4000 in the few seats I’ve looked at.
"Overall there needs to be a rethink about Local Government."
It's unlikely to happen under this government because the status quo suits them well. The postal system has long had its day because half the population don't check their letterboxes and if they do, the contents get chucked without being opened.
I don't know why Leoni wasn't supported by the Labour Party, but doubt it would have made much difference because it is the lower income groups who tend not to vote in LB elections. The landed gentry on the other hand have a stake in the outcome by way of influence, so their candidates usually get elected. It makes an unsatisfactory system worse which brings us back to the core problem. That is, the status quo suits right wing governments well.
Now that's an excellent way of framing the debate.
New Zealand has dismantled the entrenched political and economic privileges of the landed classes and slumlords before.
There’s no reason we can't do it again.
They don't see a future in pesky local representative micky, jeez they're doing their best to decimate central gov't whilst attacking NZ's foundations.
Damaged beyond repair sounds a familiar approach …..hello health system.
Yes, there was definitely a shift to the right. No doubt driven by the government’s constant attacks on councils, public discomfort with rising rates, and a dismal turnout.
In the long run, though, this will probably come back to bite both voters and the government. The short-term satisfaction of “sending a message” and "getting back to basics" doesn’t fix the structural issues that make local government so brittle. Winning elections is one thing. Governing is quite another.
And while it’s disappointing to see so many Māori wards disappear, there’s also room for hope. Fourteen councils have voted to keep theirs: and that shows that even though the demographics of the electorate haven’t fundamentally changed, attitudes have.
There’s a growing acceptance of Māori participation in local democracy, and a clear distaste for the culture-war nonsense being pushed from Wellington.
As someone that works in the sector, im deeply worried about what this means in the long term. But it also could have been a lot worse.
When there is such an abysmal turnout at local level it tends to mean a high proportion of the people who voted were self-interested property owners, often voting in two districts. This would tend to push the vote to the Right.
Couple this with:
1. the widespread large rises in rates meant that anybody who mentioned controlling rates rises/getting better value for your rates would get votes. Again this would tend towards the Right.
2. People who wanted to get rid of the Maori Wards would be highly motivated. (Plenty of Atlas/ACT money probably helped in the background.) Again these tend to be people from the Right.
So overall these elections were not really useful as a barometer for the national election next year, except for the reminder that a high turnout next year would help the Left.
People who wanted to get rid of the Maori Wards would be highly motivated. (Plenty of Atlas/ACT money probably helped in the background.) Again these tend to be people from the Right
Got any evidence to support that?
Let me finish the sentence for you:
I like rates rises; they are effectively a Wealth Tax.
That is why ACT hates them.
BTW my own rates went up shedloads this year.
they're a very poorly targeted wealth tax. Many people who own property with a large mortgage and a low income are struggling atm.
Well they bought the house and took out that large mortgage. Home-ownership never was a certain bet for capital gain.
But I agree that rates are not a perfect Wealth Tax. They would be fairer and work better as a WT if, say, the first $200k-250k of the property and house value was not subject to rates. This would mean better off people with valuable properties would pay more rates and the less well off would pay proportionally less.
BTW this option would not mean the Council raised less money. It would mean that the rates would be higher above $200k-250k to bring in the same amount of money.
that seems a sensible compromise.
Not everyone has the choices you are implying. An elderly person on a pension might have high rates and little ability to pay.
Thanks Weka.
I actually only just thought of the above option.
I doubt that Labour would have the guts to implement it of course, despite the fact that it would almost certainly bring in far more votes from low and middle income home owners than would be lost from the wealthy mansion set.
Most Councils have rates rebates you can get if you are on a lower income.
afaik it doesn't work for people who have higher income but no disposable income.
It's easy to not feel sorry for people who bought houses they later couldn't afford, but when it affects so many people, the idea that they can just sell up and move separates families and destroys communities. Our housing system is insane.
The problem with that system is similar to what happens with income tax brackets.
If you don’t adjust the thresholds regularly, you eventually end up with the same issue we have now, where the nominal value of your property far exceeds your actual ability to pay the rates on it.
It’s also worth remembering that property values aren’t evenly distributed across the country. A house in Auckland will have a much higher CV than an equivalent one in my little corner of rural Manawatū.
So the threshold would either have to be set on a per-council or per-region basis, which adds complexity and creates pressure for councils to set the theoretical rating threshold unrealistically high. It’s much the same as the debate councils already have each year about where to set the UAGC.
Res-I don't see that you would have to vary the rates-free threshold depending on district house values across NZ.
You could make it the first $100k or $200k rate-free across NZ. Or the local council could be given the right to choose a rate-free threshold between $100k and $200k. (Maybe they already have this power?)
It might benefit people more in the poorer parts of NZ where house prices are lower but that's ok.
That’s a neat idea in principle, but in practice it would blow a hole in a lot of council budgets. I work in local government, and the rates system is already pretty fragile.
It’s one of the few revenue tools councils actually control, and even small tweaks can have big downstream effects.
If you exempted the first $200k, districts with a higher proportion of modest properties (like most rural or provincial councils) would see their rateable base collapse. They’d have to crank up the multiplier on what’s left just to maintain the same revenue, which effectively punishes the middle of the market.
In wealthier areas, the same rule would barely make a dent, so you’d actually increase regional inequality.
The other issue is elasticity. Central government can absorb shocks; councils can’t. They have fixed infrastructure costs; pipes, roads, waste, water, that don’t scale down with land value. If a threshold like that isn’t indexed or regionally adjusted, you’d either strangle councils in poorer regions or push rates so high in others that only the wealthy could afford to stay in.
Designing good, equitable tax systems is hard work. Every fix shifts the distortion somewhere else, and the politics usually hit long before the benefits land.
As I said above, it would not affect the Council's revenue from rates. They would levy exactly the same amount but more from the rich people.
Somebody with a house and land worth $500k would pay considerably less rates.
AI tells me that here are 81 suburbs in NZ that have an average value below $500k.
It’s just as lazy to say “just shift the tax burden onto the rich” as it is to tell poor people to “just work harder.”
It all depends on whose definition of rich you’re using. We already have enough inequality without inventing a new kulak class to punish simply for owning property.
Sure, a lot of homeowners look rich on paper. But that doesn’t mean they can magically absorb huge rate hikes.
Push it far enough and you don’t get fairness; you get feudalism. A handful of mega-landlords end up owning everything, and the rest of us go back to being tenants on their estates.
I’d rather see a system that keeps alive a credible dream of home ownership for people on the median wage. While still giving councils the means to fund themselves sustainably.
Res-it appears to me, from what you have argued here, that you would rather maintain the status quo, where the tax system perpetuates the current chronic unfair distribution of wealth.
I think the underlying assumption of rates is that the value of your property correlates with you level of wealth/income and therefore ability to pay.
It simply wasn't designed for a world where pensioners live in multimillion dollar houses.
The problem for local government is the lack of any other independent, fair or equitable basis for taxation that doesn't involve massively complicated double dipping on top of existing tax mechanisms (like a local sales tax), massive inequities (a poll tax) or relying on central government (sharing GST)
and doesn't work for people who are asset rich and cash poor and can't pay the accumulating debt.
What's the problem of partially relying on central government eg via a wealth tax?
Partially relying on central government makes local government dependent on the centre both to collect and to distribute the revenue. This creates a vulnerability: The government of the day can choose to cap, redirect, or withhold funds.
For local democracy to be viable and legitimate, local authorities need meaningful control over their own revenue sources. Without that fiscal autonomy, accountability and responsiveness to local citizens are weakened to the point of meaninglessness.
We’re already seeing this in practice, with the government using its control of the FAR and NZTA funding to dictate council spending on things like speed bumps and cycleways: even when these are projects strongly supported by local communities.
Any reform of local government should aim to give communities more autonomy, not less.
Rates are simply one expense among many; those strugging should be assistedd by central government.
It’s about time we had a mature conversation about rates in NZ. I for one would favour the UK Council tax model, having paid into that system for many years as a renter. It’s as fairer distribution of burden based loosely on services paid for by those consuming those services.
No that system is crap; Thatcher brought it in. It means the renters have to pay more and property owners less.
Of course it means more have to pay. It’s certainly not a perfect system. But as the TV program use to say as a “starter for 10” I refer it over our rates system, particularly as the ratio of renters to owners rises. It’s a bit like the retirement debate in NZ – a looming burden on a shrinking payee base but one we as a nation seem unable (or unwilling) to have a mature conversation about.
I agree. I was in the UK when Thatcher bought in the Council Tax. Many of us protested against it.
These days it is considered unfair, but it's hard to find an alternative people can agree on. For some strange reason the current Council Tax is based on 1991 property values.
I'd favour a land tax, though also, a more progressive tax based on income, and maybe also wealth would be better, though ATM there are some criteria for being able to get a reduction of how much CT a person pays, based, for eg on age, income, benefit.
I also would favour a (universal) land tax, offset though by suitable reductions income tax. The tax could be collected by local authorities by way of being added to rates demands, and paid by them to central government, subject to a suitable deduction by way of commission.
But BG, you are assuming the property owners pay the rates for their properties.
All the korero around the landlording business is that it is a cost so it is factored into rent. Along with insurance interest etc.
Can you elaborate? Can you provide a link and a working example?
I've looked at a few links, and none say anything about it being based on services an individual uses.
eg this one gives some egs of unfairness eg
Basically there's various set criteria, and nothing about services used. However, Council Tax does provide 30% of council budgets.
They see local government as a means to an end – an end to progressive taxes, and a means to deliver private profits. "Keeping Rates Low" was always a way of limiting local government rather than being efficient – user pays for rubbish collection has resulted in many roads benefitting from up to four different company trucks on some roads, water charges will deliver profits to banks as well as private contractors – and we don't talk about debt limits . . .
Huge shoutout to everyone who is still politically active in local government elections. It takes a mighty amount of will power to keep going when the scope for local politics is being consistently hammered and squeezed by central government legislation and pressure.
In particular a big shoutout to Mickey Savage for tireless championing of local politics in the west of Auckland for multiple decades. And clearly shows no sign of retiring yet. Sir, you raise the banner high.
I have finally found a computer that isn't rejecting the new Cloud repository for TS.
Queenstown Lakes seems to have done alright this year despite the low turnout.
Quite an emphatic fuck off to the past Mayor and associated faction, 6 new faces around the table and aspiration to do things differently. Could be some fiery / litigatious times coming up, some of the big ego developer class might not take this well. Also wouldn't be surprised if a couple of prominent people from QLDC circles quietly, and quickly, leave town. (not an unprecedented Qtn phenomenon once the skeletons start rattling)
I hope John Glover can keep the Council, and staff unified and in tune to community aspirations.
I am pleased to see Tori Whanau back, in council, as representatative for the Maori ward.
PS: Sorry, Wellington Council, not Queenstown Lakes.
Has there been an update? – last news reports I heard was that she'd missed out, and Matthew Rewiti has been elected.
https://wellington.govt.nz/your-council/elections/2025-elections/results/maori-ward
Yes. You are correct. There must have been an uodate.
Rawiti is in.
There is a whole commentary to do comparing Sir Geoffrey Palmer's warnings about the decline of New Zealand democracy to local government politics in New Zealand. THe situation is dire.
Palmer would also be gutted that the right of the public to get involved in resource consent applications, which constitutes democracy that is inherent in the RMA, has been unceremoniously dumped by this government.
Palmer was one of the key authors of the RMA.
Yes. Only those who never wanted people to have a fair say do well in this Government.
Yay Dunedin, new council a bit more left leaning than the old one, a couple hard righties & Calvert is back on the ORC (she can't seem to stay away from the public tit) but the new mayor seems kinda cool (acknowledges climate change & is a staunch ally of the hospital).
Think this round of loval body elections was a small victory for the left & diversity despite the pathetic & apathetic turnout.
1 Andrew Little/ more lefties
2 Fran Wild vs dozen of richest Town/property developer
3 West coast 2nd trans mayor
4 Nador Left & possibly 1st with dreads?
5 Ken Laban..Winnies siblings 1st PI mayor
Just a sprinkling of examples there maybe more.And of course Maori wards going is hugely disappointing.
*Doyen of richest
* More left councilors Wellington wards
I've got a query about how the results are reported in the STV elections, like Otago Regional Council.
In the Dunedin Regional Constituency,
What does "final quota" refer to, and how do they report the turnout? The figure for blank votes wouldn't be too bad if you consider that the Dunedin Regional Constituency roughly equates to Dunedin City, which had 44.49% turnout, being 42,146 voting papers.
The final quota in an STV election is the quota at the last iteration i.e. the number of votes required to elect a candidate in the final round of counting. As preferences are exhausted throughout the process, the total pool of transferable votes decreases, and the quota correspondingly drops.
Turnout is simply the number of voting papers returned, regardless of how many contests on the paper were actually voted in. However, blank or informal votes aren’t included in the STV count itself.
Only formal votes are used to calculate the quota and distribute preferences.
Looks like a chunk of voters chose to participate in the Dunedin City Council, or their local district council elections, but didn't choose a regional council candidate.