Speaker 1: You're listening to the Weekend Collective podcast from News Talks.
Speaker 2: The'd be almost all of our local government representatives, or
Speaker 2: many of them, especially mayors, have had a public persona
Speaker 2: before they went forward for the role. But is that
Speaker 2: all it takes? We see Andrew Little has signaled, although
Speaker 2: he hasn't formally announced, it's probably going to happen tomorrow.
Speaker 2: It would be my guest that he's going to run
Speaker 2: for the mayoralty for Wellington. But what do we want
Speaker 2: to actually want out of our local government? As name
Speaker 2: recognition enough anyway? Formal Local Government Minister David Carter joins me. Now, David,
Speaker 2: good afternoon.
Speaker 3: Good afternoon, Tim.
Speaker 2: So is it the devil you know that makes us
Speaker 2: vote for people that we've known in other public roles?
Speaker 2: How big an issue is this?
Speaker 3: I think profile definitely helps. The good news would be
Speaker 3: trying to get people out to vote in the first place,
Speaker 3: because the turnout for local government election tier in New
Speaker 3: Zealand's pathetic. But except that, then, if you've got some profile,
Speaker 3: you've got to be a chance. That's no doubt about that.
Speaker 3: And Levandrew Level was to decide a dance name for
Speaker 3: the Warranted Mayority his profile would be high enough, I
Speaker 3: think he'd be a very good bet, and frankly, I
Speaker 3: think he'd be an excellent beer as well. So profile helps,
Speaker 3: but it's not essential.
Speaker 2: But we can all imagine where we have voted, perhaps
Speaker 2: for someone who is quite well known, who perhaps didn't
Speaker 2: turn out to be the mayor that we wanted. How
Speaker 2: do we actually get good mayors? I mean, because let's
Speaker 2: face it, if you're a bit of a sports celebrity
Speaker 2: or something, you know, you're well ahead of the person
Speaker 2: who might actually know a lot more about it than you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's the point I'm making. If you've
Speaker 3: got a profile, you'd likely to have more chance of
Speaker 3: getting there. But bear in mind, once you're on the
Speaker 3: council table, you're but one vote. So many mayors or
Speaker 3: many people seem to think the mayor has a more
Speaker 3: significant role than other councilors, that's not the case. How
Speaker 3: do we get people who are interested in being local
Speaker 3: body politicians, be at a council or a mayor. Let
Speaker 3: get people who are really accountable for what they're there for,
Speaker 3: and that is to wisely spend our rate payers money.
Speaker 3: And that would be a vast improvement if we could
Speaker 3: get that on many of the councils that I observed.
Speaker 2: Are you sort of saying in a way, Look, especially
Speaker 2: with mayors, it's like they've only got one vote. If
Speaker 2: you get allowsy one who cares. I'm sorry to be
Speaker 2: so cnical, but just got it bluntly.
Speaker 3: No, I'm definitely not saying that, but I'm saying that
Speaker 3: once the mayor is elected as mayor, he then only
Speaker 3: has one vote. So if that person is an extremely
Speaker 3: good mayor but has a hopeless council it makes it
Speaker 3: very difficult for that person to then perform and show
Speaker 3: return for his time as a mayor. He is once
Speaker 3: the mayor is there, he is but one around the
Speaker 3: council table. How do we get a better quality of
Speaker 3: person standing to be a councilor or a mayor in
Speaker 3: the first place?
Speaker 2: Well, how do we get the better counselors?
Speaker 1: Then?
Speaker 2: Do you think or is it just like of the drawer?
Speaker 3: A lot of that getting goes back to profile. It's
Speaker 3: not the most of the warning of careers. I don't think.
Speaker 3: I think for someone on the left it's an improved salary.
Speaker 3: For those on the right, they're out there doing your
Speaker 3: own thing. It's probably a superposed to do it. My
Speaker 3: own father was on the Crossias City count for forty years.
Speaker 3: He did it in the time when these guys at
Speaker 3: that time didn't even get paid to do the job.
Speaker 3: There was a true sense of doing it for the
Speaker 3: right purposes, of doing it because you wanted to improve
Speaker 3: your city. My observation of the councilor is that we
Speaker 3: have now many of them aren't there with that focus.
Speaker 3: They see it as a career. I don't think it's
Speaker 3: highly rewarded, but probably some people do think it's well
Speaker 3: rewarded and they make a career of it. And often
Speaker 3: they didn't use that for stepping stone in the central
Speaker 3: government politics, don't they.
Speaker 2: Or stepping or the other directionists we might say with
Speaker 2: Andrew Little, I guess turnout. What can we do to
Speaker 2: improve turnout and engagement in local body politics? Do you think?
Speaker 3: I wish I had the answer to that, because I
Speaker 3: think turn out as pathetic. I think most people just ignore.
Speaker 3: But I think people feel a bit disenfranchise that they
Speaker 3: can't make a difference. But frankly, if they were to
Speaker 3: vote and we had a higher turnout of voters, that
Speaker 3: would make a difference. Part of upon now this postal wedding,
Speaker 3: and of course I wouldn't know where to go and
Speaker 3: post my papers when they finally arrived in the mailbox,
Speaker 3: and I have to serve take able to find a
Speaker 3: mailbox and then I hope like it on New Zealand
Speaker 3: post clear it within a month that I posted. So
Speaker 3: it's actually account and vote. The post system now is obsolete.
Speaker 3: It's hopeless. We've got to find a better way to
Speaker 3: get people voting, and I guess we're going to have
Speaker 3: to go to some sort of online system.
Speaker 2: Well, and actually I'm wondering if secretly what you're what
Speaker 2: you're suggesting is it would it be better if we
Speaker 2: went back to the day where we just had a
Speaker 2: day where we all turn up to our local ballot
Speaker 2: box and vote. What do you prefer? What do you
Speaker 2: think we'd get more people engaged? Because there's something about
Speaker 2: seeing the voting booths out there, isn't it. You get
Speaker 2: this visibility in the community, you get the signs the campaign.
Speaker 2: You just get more awareness of it, don't you You do?
Speaker 3: And if you think back to those days when we
Speaker 3: did it that way, which now must be twenty plus
Speaker 3: years ago, if you study then the turnout, because I
Speaker 3: think they were greater. Maybe one of the solutions. I
Speaker 3: think it's either of those two. It's either we go
Speaker 3: online or go back to a polling booth on the
Speaker 3: day and you get down there and vote. It's either
Speaker 3: those two solutions. We're going to have to move away
Speaker 3: from postal voting for sure. Yeah.
Speaker 2: What about in terms of just what advice would you
Speaker 2: be giving to local government candidates to get their message
Speaker 2: out there? Because look up, I'll be honest, I think
Speaker 2: it's probably one of I'm not sure if it's the
Speaker 2: most highly read sort of section of the paper, the
Speaker 2: local government sort of thing, But how would you get
Speaker 2: your message out there if you're not known. You've got
Speaker 2: some great ideas well.
Speaker 3: It's back to the name recognition and the agile way
Speaker 3: of doing is actually just get out there amongst your
Speaker 3: local community, get your your hoardings up there so people
Speaker 3: do recognize the name, get out there and do the
Speaker 3: hard work, actually do the door knocking. It's the way
Speaker 3: most central government politicians actually get there. They get out
Speaker 3: there and spend months and months and months wearing out
Speaker 3: the shoe live and look on doorsteps even if nobody's home.
Speaker 3: You can leave a card and say you're there. I
Speaker 3: think the voters want to know they're going to get
Speaker 3: somebody who's a worker. And if you get out there
Speaker 3: and do that sort of hard yards, you'll be recognized.
Speaker 3: If you've got wander up and knock on one door
Speaker 3: and speak to somebody, and then the next door there's
Speaker 3: nobody there, that neighbor will talk and say that particular
Speaker 3: candidate knocked on those dooors. That's part of the job
Speaker 3: is a candidate has to be prepared to show there
Speaker 3: a worker.
Speaker 2: What about the party politics side of things? What do
Speaker 2: you I'm not a big fan of major political parties
Speaker 2: getting in there, but there are sort of ways people
Speaker 2: identify themselves as left or right. Do you think we
Speaker 2: should try and keep party politics out of the local
Speaker 2: government side of things.
Speaker 3: I think we'd be naive to think the party politics
Speaker 3: aren't already there now. The national party doesn't much to
Speaker 3: do with candidates, but the Labor Greens units, particularly my
Speaker 3: city of christ are far more organized and they work
Speaker 3: well at election time getting their people out to vote.
Speaker 3: So while they all crane, they're standing is some sort
Speaker 3: of independent. Many of them are deeply embedded in party politics,
Speaker 3: particularly on the left, and they then get the machine
Speaker 3: Henry associated with the Labor Party and the Green Party
Speaker 3: working for them.
Speaker 2: Do you pay attention and yourself as a voter, how
Speaker 2: much effort do you go to get your head around
Speaker 2: who are you voting for.
Speaker 3: I'll definitely work on that, but I guess listen, I'll
Speaker 3: be guided by where I think their politics are, my
Speaker 3: secret where my politics lie. And I suspect I'll have
Speaker 3: somebody standing in my bank's minitial award for christ the
Speaker 3: City Council who's clearly aligned to the Labor Party, and
Speaker 3: I'll have somebody else who will not be aligned to
Speaker 3: the Labor Party. Whether that person's aligned to a right
Speaker 3: I've sent a political party or completely independent, that will
Speaker 3: affect my vote. If I get a chance, I'll go
Speaker 3: and see that person or both candidates perform at some
Speaker 3: sort of candidates meeting, and I'll be asking questions around
Speaker 3: amphability for rates and rate increases because local government's got
Speaker 3: away with murder over the last year. Is it dis
Speaker 3: bouncing up rates extraordinary levels when we've been living through
Speaker 3: the cost of living curses?
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, gosh, there are some big issues to get
Speaker 2: your hit around, as a voter, aren't there Hey, David,
Speaker 2: really appreciate your time this afternoon. Thanks so much, Always
Speaker 2: appreasure Thanks to cheers David.
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