Despite Section 14 of the Local Government Act 2002 stating “a local authority should conduct its business in an open, transparent, and democratically accountable manner”, many councils have tried hard to do the opposite and that was the case under KCDC bosses Dougherty and Maxwell. It was the main reason why Dougherty wanted his personal backwatcher in the form of lawyer Tim Power who was kept on by Maxwell for the same reason. In 2023 Nigel Wilson managed to convince new CEO Darren Edwards to tell Mr Power to Stuff off and he is now in the Penrith council in Greater Sydney (although Power was so incompetent that we expect they regret appointing him by now.)
Former KCDC Councilor Gwynn Compton examines the problem in the latest post of his Local Aotearoa blog.
Despite having outgoing Ombudsman Peter Boshier write with a “please explain” over their refusal to open up their secret workshops and briefings, documents exclusively obtained by Local Aotearoa show Upper Hutt City Council and Greater Wellington Regional Council have thumbed their noses at the Ombudsman. Their ongoing refusal to meet the Ombudsman’s expectations around workshops and briefings being “open to the public by default” comes as a majority of the local government sector has embraced this greater level of engagement, transparency, scrutiny, and accountability with their communities.
Upper Hutt City Council holds secret workshop to decide to keep holding secret workshops
In a move that speaks volumes about Upper Hutt City Council’s commitment to transparency, on 12 May the council held a secret workshop facilitated by an external firm (Meeting and Governance Solutions) where they decided to keep holding secret workshops.
Despite the council noting the Ombudsman’s recommendations included things like “live streams and/or audio-visually records workshops” and that there should be a “principle of openness by default for workshops”, the council’s response was that their practice was to not record workshops though they would consider livestreaming on a “case by case” basis. Likewise, they decided that “Workshops are not open to the public”.
The “direction” from the meeting – which let’s not pretend the “direction” given is anything other than a decision by elected members about a council policy – was that “workshops are to be held without public present” and “workshops will not be livestreamed.”
Of course, this is problematic as in the Ombudsman’s “Open for Business” report, the Ombudsman directly addressed this type of behaviour in workshops, noting that “Provided an actual and effective decision is not made, deliberative discussion may take place in a workshop.” The problem here is that Upper Hutt City Council has made an effective decision – that decision being that they will not open up or livestream their briefings and workshops.