Nominations now open for the 2023 Jonesie Waste Awards

I would like to nominate Buller District Council who ignored advice from a consultant regarding a flooding threat in 2015 resulting in a Buller River flood causing a quarter billion dollars of damage. This resulted in an approach to government to build $40 million dollars worth of floodwalls around the town. But ….. in the meantime BDC secured a $million from NEMA to strengthen the harbour wall (on the Buller River) at what is arguably its strongest point and merely several hundred meters from the river mouth where any breach would cause no property damage. BDC accepted cheap rock from the contractor and not the expensive rock specified. Local contractors complained because their tender had been rejected because of price and they could have secured the work had they been informed they could supply a cheaper material. “Too bad” said BDC, “we can do whatever we like”.

“Great job” said the government (NEMA) “you have done the million dollar job for only $800,000 so keep the change from the million we gave you, it’s only taxpayers money”.

(There are literally miles of protection walls on the Buller River and where this rock was put is the STRONGEST section of them all. Meanwhile, and it is now more than two years since the devastating flood, no money has been spent that will reduce the risk of another flood that would cause another quarter billion dollar loss to taxpayers and ratepayers.) Over the years BDC has increased staff numbers from under thirty to over two hundred to serve a district that has had no population growth to justify it. Lots of staff, lots of rates and nothing effective is achieved, lots of failures and that list is exceeding long and expensive.

Grant Robertson

Whanganui District Council

The Sargent Art Gallery

In 2015 Whanganui Mayor Annette Mains announced a plan to earthquake strengthen and extend the Sargent Art Gallery.

Most of the cost was central government funded and the balance was through publicly raised donations.

Mains said not 1 dollar from Ratepayers money was needed.

The total cost as Quoted by Mains on a RNZ interview would be no more than 30 million dollars.

In the past 8 years of the building project new estimates of the total project costs were regularly given, the latest in June 2023 was 69 million dollars.

A 39 million increase (so far) equates to an average weekly increase in costs of nearly 100,000 per week ?

Most of this 39 million will have to come from Ratepayers.

The project is estimated to be finished by May 2024. Based on the average cost increases the final cost will be around 73 to 75 million for a project estimated to cost no more than 30 million

Then there are other added costs, this week council announced a total of 425,000 dollars has be budgeted towards landscape designs around the new Sargent building. The building already sits in an established park. This 425,000 is only fo “design work” once again the Ratepayers will foot the bill.

The Sargent Art collection was valued recently at 30 million, that will be housed in a building costing at least 73 million.

Entry will be free, thus no direct income will be generated. Annual running costs will be over 5 million pa.

The Whanganui District has a total population of less than 50,000.

We have a rate rise average of 8.5% and many infrastructure projects in dire need of attention.

I nominate the current Public Service Commissioner is Peter Hughes. On his watch he has allowed a number of his Departments including DOC, Ministry for the Environment (MfE) and the Ministry of Māori Development (Te Puni Kokiri/TPK) in offering staff bonuses for proficiency in Māori language. The bonuses are unrelated to practical job requirements. This is done irrespective of the fact that none of the Departments are working within their budgets.

Grant Robinson for totally wasting Tax payer’s money on things of no value to any of us when that money should have been spent on issues of Health and Medicine, it should also go to Tauranga Council, (Ann Tolley) for the really annoying and total waste of Rate Payers money on road works that have now gone on for a couple of years, disrupting and destroying our beautiful City for works that never needed to be done. (This one really gets up my nose as well as all Tauranga residents!!)

Grant Robertson. There are so many instances where the Labour Party have wasted taxpayer cash that there isn’t enough room here to list them.

Masterton District Council again….. I promise this is the last as the list is endless…


Te Hapori Skatepark proposed to be built at a cost of $1M last year ended up costing ratepayers $2M, and then Council added a “Youth Hub” to the project estimated to cost an additional $500k. They recently paid a deposit of $267k to a company called Podular, to build a hub facility, whose Director, Charles Innes, was a former bankrupt. No due diligence undertaken! Podular has now gone into liquidation. Neither MDC nor ratepayers will recover any of those funds. MDC are currently exploring new options to deliver a youth hub facility at what cost we don’t know…. and ratepayers are paying for Charles Innes to live in a beachfront property in Perth – and that won’t be a podular home!


Climate change grants – $50k budgeted by MDC this year. The first round of grants were recently allocated to eight local groups. One group received $3250 to build five “bug hotels” that will be situated in community spaces to do what?; another group allocated $7750 towards the delivery of workshops focussed on sustainable personal care products (period poverty?); $7750 allocated towards a part time youth climate and sustainability leader to support sustainability projects at Shady Mellow (a kids indoor skate/scooter & playground); $5000 for an electric bike or cargo bike to be stationed at a community hub (will get pinched eventually). The list goes on, however, groups that are dependent on public funds usually collapse into oblivion and fail the moment the funding stops. We question how any of these grants will address climate change in any meaningful way in Masterton? Rates arrears are rocketing and residents are still living with sewage in their backyards, but our Councillors, who were elected to stop the wastage, still think its ok to give away money we don’t have to build 5 “bug hotels”. Beggars belief.


Dog Pound – originally costed at $1.5M now projected to cost $2.5M. You could build 5 good quality homes for that amount of money. What are we building here – Pooch City – with luxury carpet, inhouse TVs and internet connections…. give me strength!


Keep up the good work!!!!

Masterton District Council – three more examples of wasting ratepayers money.

Hood Aerodrome. MDC has once again failed to budget enough money to complete a major project. Information is scarce on the progress of Hood Aerodrome, even though it is currently MDC’s largest active project. The project team can’t even complete stage one of a three stage project without finding extra funding. In addition there is insufficient money available to complete stage 2 (which involves the purchase of land to extend the runway) and unsurprisingly the project status is currently (in the) "red"… No questions were asked by Councillors about the project’s progress at the last briefing to them in June. There is more bad news. It has been revealed that MDC’s plan to get a return on the $17M investment in Hood has failed dismally. None of the “tranche 2” land leases created by this project for hangar plots have been sold despite being on sale for over a year. Significant sums were invested by MDC in roads and underground services to develop these lots and there are no signs that there will be any extra income as a result of this investment. The Hood Masterplan indicated the demand for these plots were considered “high priority” in the short to medium term. The bad news continues. As a result of MDC’s plan to widen and develop the aerodrome, the CAA will require the aerodrome to operate under a “Qualifying Aerodrome Operator Certificate”. The council did not anticipate this unless passenger planes with more than 30 seats were using the aerodrome (which even MDC admits is extremely unlikely). The costs of running the aerodrome will surely rise due to this news because extra staffing and investment in aerodrome infrastructure will surely be needed. These extra costs will not have been included in any council budget and will once again need to be found from the bank of ratepayers if this project is to continue.

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Swimming/Spa pool inspections have increased last year from $36 to $165 to pay for the full cost of the inspector’s time. One resident said a pool inspector recently came onto her property, with no warning, opened the lid of her spa pool, said it was fine, stayed less than 5 minutes, and she received an invoice for $165 the following week. Great hourly wage rate for a Council employee.

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Litigation Case – How does a taxpayer’s organisation sue a ratepayer’s organisation? Because it’s not coming out of their own pockets!! Te Whatu Ora (DHB) is suing Masterton District Council for $90M in a High Court litigation case due to start in the High Court at the end of July and is expected to last four weeks. This litigation is based on MDC’s apparent negligence and duty to exercise reasonable care and skill in issuing a code of compliance certificate for the hospital during its construction dating back more than 12 years? The Hospital alleges defects in the construction and as a result does not comply with the current Building Code. Te Whatu Ora are claiming damages for negligence of just under $90M plus GST, interest and costs on top. MDC is disputing the claim – at ratepayers’ expense, and no doubt this will be settled by insurance indemnity behind closed doors. The rise in insurance premiums was one excuse by MDC for our rates increase this year!

Masterton District Council

Here is one reason why. We have plenty of others!


Masterton pole (pou) dancing or an expensive pair of triplets?

Masterton District Council (MDC) unveiled a pair of sculptures at the north and south ends of the region’s main township back in 2015 that were mired in controversy over council bungles, widespread criticism, and a cost blowout, that forced the Council to pause the project. The project was overseen by the council’s “communications strategy task group”, which was roundly criticised in social and other media after the project tripled its original budget of $35,000 but still failed to come up with something decipherable to drivers on State Highway 2. The sculptures feature nine symbols depicting Wairarapa life chosen via public consultation to represent life in the Wairarapa. They were forged from deliberately rusted iron and perched on two sets of three 15-metre wooden poles at the town’s main entrances. The original rusty icons had been manufactured and installed on the poles, wrapped in black polythene, ready to be unveiled to the amazed populace. Fortunately, a gust of wind exposed what was a miniature version of what we have now. The miniatures were quickly removed and replaced with a larger set, all at additional expense to ratepayers. The project budget blew out to $92,000 and was labelled “council lunacy” by disgruntled ratepayers, and was understood to have contributed to one council staff member leaving his job. But the $92,000 spent could have risen further because when asked what was going to happen with the original smaller icons Council advised that they would use them to create smaller pole versions on the eastern and western entries to Masterton. The CEO at the time wrote a public apology to the Wairarapa Times-Age, saying the project had not been well managed and he was launching internal and external reviews (all at ratepayers’ expense) to ensure ratepayers’ money was not wasted! Council staff at the time blamed the cost blow out on extra crane hire, landscaping, metalwork, and structural engineering costs for the bill. The Council finally voted to pause the project until the review was completed. Councillor (now Mayor) Gary Caffell said the project had not fulfilled its original idea and had no future. “In the end it’s become an absolute disaster … it has taken a hell of a bashing from the public.” The northern trio were installed on private land, but were removed at an additional cost of $7000 in 2021 because a developer who bought the land wanted them gone. At the same time, it was revealed that the matching set at the southern entrance to Masterton were erected outside the district, in neighbouring Carterton, and without the correct permissions. MDC had to negotiate with its neighbouring council over a retrospective resource consent! There are no plans to remove the Waingawa triplets from their wrongful placement in Carterton. The northern end triplets sit in storage awaiting their new site (which is still to be confirmed) and in the meantime the ratepayer pays for ongoing storage costs. A triple whammy. And this week our current Mayor, Gary Caffell, is now sounding out the public for a new structure that could be installed in the middle of the township! Who said triplets aren’t expensive!

Labour Govt. giving $19 Million to S.E. Asian wetland preservation. Plenty of things in NZ that could use that money. Duh.

updating human rights commission site , half a billion dollars i believe

Grant (we can afford it) Robertson.

For wasting the nation’s money time after time, and now wanting wealth tax .

Ana Lork MP

Has spent the last 3 years wallpapering Hastings with name recognition posters at the taxpayers expense.

Must also be one of Hawkes Bay Today’s biggest advertising customers, with the same nonsense paid for by the taxpayer.

The pretense is that they are informative, but the reality is Anna is everywhere.

I would like to nominate Grant Robertson as he is like a pig in a trough with our finances and not only that he looks like a hog

The whole of the Maori Caucus for pushing the Govt. to spend $millions on setting up a separate Maori Health Authority when it was obvious to all there was never going to be doctors and nurses to staff it. Result is Maori use the same doctors and nurses as all the other races except they get ahead of the queue. Govt. could have done that in the existing Health Authority without spending all that money on paper pushers.

Chris Hipkins for taking a ‘spare’ aircraft on a recent overseas trip.

wellington mere.. for forgetting to pay for meal. kiri allen for drunk driving.. good example setter…

main vote would be cindy.. andrew little. grant robertson and chris hipkins for all the covid crap… protest… national lock down and for no apologies… also congrats to NZ for placing highest in excess deaths… an achievements an achievement

Whanganuinui District Council.

In 2015 the then Mayor of Whanganui made public plans for earthquake strengthing and extensions to the citys Sargent Gallery.

The cost was quoted by Main to not exceed 30 million dollars and would be totally funded by central Government grants and donations.

Main was quoted as saying no ratepayer money would be used in the gallerys reconstruction.

Wind forward nearly 8 years and the latest cost estimate by council is now 78 million! That’s nearly half a million rise every month from the original estimate.

So guess what the ratepayer in a city of under 40,000 people and district of under 50,000 has to pick up the shortfall.

Our rates have had to rise on average of over 8.5% a large portion of that to pay for a gallery worth currently 78 million to house a collection valued at around 30 million.

There will be no direct income generated from the once completed gallery (free entry).

The gallery is due to be completes around March next year at current costs estimates escalating at $500, 000 per month this has a potential end cost of being somewhere in the mid 80 millions.

Now it’s been announced that further costs of over $400,000 have been added for landscaping (design work only) I hate to think what the actual cost will be for actual construction!.

Blenheim ( a similar sized town) recently built a new library, art gallery for just over 20 million.

New Plymouth has a 10 year old modern art gallery center that cost 12 million.

How about the two private jets to the other side of the world? That is so crazy. I think ol chippy just wanted bragging rights at the conferance. “I arrived in TWO private jets”

Auckland Council, $100,000 a day for 5 years on legal and accounting during the Covid pandemic, and the worst weather to hit Auckland in Decades, no wonder there is nothing left in Kitty to help YOUR ratepayers. Thanks Rodney Hide and National, the architects of the “SuperCity”, must be the worst decision in Auckland’s history. Well done Wellington for giving the middle finger to the same fate!

‘Safety’ trucks with their flashing lights and oodles of road cones – these are a distraction and hazard and a waste of money – men paid to sit in trucks (usually not seeming to be doing anything)

Grant Robertson for the LSAP which has indebted the country for decades

Current govt. for wasting money on 10 new entities for Three Waters when we already have 11 Regional Councils in place with staff and infrastructure., AND for not upgrading the Hurunui River bridge (one way) on State Highway 1, in Nth Canty., and wasting money on bloody cycle lanes in cities., AND for not upgrading the Ashburton River bridge on SHW 1, which cuts the Sth Is. in half., AND for not upgrading the numerous One Way bridges on the main highway to the West Coast from Canty., in anticipation of the Alpine Fault rupturing some time soon.

Jacinda Ardern. Why? Where do I start. Failed attempt at plastic bag ban, totalitarian government regime, a tax hike (when she said no new taxes in the first term, instead incorporated it in to an existing tax) hideous overspending of public funds which saw inflation soar. Forced medical intervention (this goes against the fundamental human right to bodily autonomy) , destroying the economy by shutting the entire country down.

Grant Robertson-for his continuous disregard of official advice to curb his spending

barcode chin mahutu

graffiti face cowboy hat

Ministry of Health purchase of “ Rat “ tests just under $500.000 million and storage of them for $45. million , expired .

1st – the whole Labour Goventment as an entity

2nd – Maori Party