Here’s a cut-to-the-bone accountability question to put to all candidates for local office in Hawke’s Bay …
In what circumstances would you support council ‘workshops’ – meetings closed to the public where council issues are discussed?
The Chief Ombudsman is investigating. He’s worried there’s significant abuse.
Note, ‘workshops’ are not the same as council meetings where some or all of agenda items are formally declared ‘public excluded’ for legitimate reasons given by the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act (LGOIMA) – for example, discussion of a commercial tender.
Rather, workshops are informal sessions ostensibly set up to provide in-depth briefings for councillors on complex (which often means, controversial) issues. For example, the Port wants to sell shares, what’s that all about? Or, how in the world are we going to provide for more housing in our district? Our councils love workshops!
The bottom line ground rule is that NO decisions are to be taken at such workshops, as that would amount to pre-determining outcomes later simply endorsed in public sessions … a calculated avoidance of accountability.
So are workshops abused by our councils? Absolutely. And this isn’t simply my observation as a former regional councillor … and decently familiar with how our other councils operate.
The smell of abuse has been sufficient for the Chief Ombudsman to announce last month “an investigation into concerns that councils are undermining local democracy by using ‘workshops’ to discuss issues and make decisions behind closed doors”.
In launching his investigation, the Chief Ombudsman noted: “Local bodies are not allowed to exclude the public from meetings so they can hold ‘free and frank’ discussions behind closed doors. Yet I fear this may be happening.”
“Councillors are elected to provide a voice for the communities they serve. They should feel free to express their opinions in the same way robust exchanges occur in the debating chamber of Parliament.”
He continued: “I am aware another barrier to openness and transparency is the quality of note-taking and record-keeping during these informal workshops. The public are within their rights to make official information requests about what has been happening during these workshops so accurate accounts are a must.”
The outcome of the investigation will be published in mid-2023.
As for my experience as a councillor, I was dragged into many ‘workshops’, objecting regularly.
Yes, these half- and sometimes full-day sessions are informative for councillors. But the same would be true for any interested citizen who wished to tune-in by video to understand the complexities of today’s issues and the trade-offs involved. Indeed, workshops could be an invaluable tool for civic education. Far more enlightening than watching an official council meeting.
But the temptation is just too irresistible for councillors (and staff) not to use these sessions to ‘test sentiment’ and ‘take the pulse’ on possible options. Perhaps innocently, to spare the staff from developing proposals that lack support; but also on occasions to cut to the chase … ‘A 20% rate increase (plug in any controversial issue) will get huge backlash from our ratepayers (or iwi or some special interest), do we want to take that on?’
So more often than not, the Ombudsman’s suspicions prove out. There comes a time in most workshops where there’s an ‘informal canvas’ of councillors’ views … round the table it goes, no votes taken. Or after hours of discussion the staff judiciously summarises the ‘consensus’ it has heard and takes that as guidance for its further work or policy. In either case, the course is set.
Eventually ‘decisions’ are officially made in sanitised, abbreviated public meetings and life goes on. For most citizens, blissfully ignorant of the local government choices that affect them, this sausage-making process is just fine – if the mint & pork sausage wins the Gold Medal, all must be well.
But arguably, if we trust our councillors to grapple with difficult issues, we should trust our citizens likewise, and empower those who wish to be informed with a better basis for forming their own judgments about the issues and the performance of their elected representatives.
BayBuzz will report on the Ombudsman’s findings.
Mōrena Tom, you asked the question, so here’s my answer….
Like you, I’m in favour of transparency. Sunlight is the best medicine. I don’t see it as being completely black & white, so my stance will need to be informed by experience once I get on board but the bias needs to be in favour of transparency.
What I have seen that over the past 3 years is that, whilst there are some superficial benefits of an apparently unified set of Councillors, transparency and most critically, communication with the public over the agenda & direction of Council has suffered.
There has been so much going on in the back room that just hasn’t seen the light of day. This in turn causes a lack of community understanding and engagement with the difficult issues Council has to grapple with, which just undermines Council’s ability to achieve desireable change.
So my first priority in all this is to see stronger & clearer communication from Council on its key strategic agenda. I’ll have a strong bias towards transparency. But I do note that the Chief Ombudsman’s comparison to the operations of Parliament ignores that behind Parliament sits a Cabinet and Opposition Shadow Cabinets, the proceedings of which we the public only ever find out what they want us to know, or very occasionally leaked!
Cheers, Xan
One wonders how many workshops have been held concerning water management?
Thanks for detailed comment here, Tom. Yours and Xan’s comments make for scary reading as a ‘member of the public’. I feel similar issues re Ahuriri Regional Park. I know long-time conservationists have concerns about little bits of ‘intentions’ that leak out at candidate meetings by current councillors (eg. ‘moving stopbanks’) Nothing available for the public to read. How far down the track will the plans be before a wider group of ‘stakeholders’ are included in the ‘conversation’ about this extremely sensitive wildlife refuge area?
It’s a difficult balance. Workshops do have legitimate uses: being able to sort through/get guidance on thorny legal and commercial issues, for example, and know what options include what liabilities etc – things that shouldn’t be aired in public and that allow councillors both to be best informed and informally chat such issues around. I don’t see that as “decision-making” as much as highlighting the ramifications of any decision – and that’s very worthwhile. And frankly if it also helps to narrow down a range of options to a handful at most then it saves both staff/ratepayer money and time. On the flipside, “full transparency” would necessitate holding several lengthy public meetings each month, doubtless boring everyone and likely achieving a less robust outcome.
Yes, there are dangers in workshopping, just as there are in caucusing, but i suggest the latter is the more abusive process (and will happen regardless) while the former leads to better understanding and, hopefully, better decisions.