Reacting to news that Let’s Get Wellington Moving (LGWM) still has almost all of it’s staff on the payroll as a zombie bureaucracy, despite the project being killed months ago, Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager, Connor Molloy, said: 

“It is no wonder that LGWM has failed to deliver any projects other than a pedestrian crossing when they can’t even handle their own disestablishment.

“A simple ‘turn the lights off on your way out and don’t come back’ would have sufficed, instead more and more public money is disappearing into the bureaucratic black hole.

“The Minister must demand an end to the LGWM gravy train immediately, we simply cannot afford to keep pouring more money into vanity projects that don’t even deliver any vanity.” 

Responding to Hamilton City Council's proposed increase of 25.5% for the 2024/25 financial year, and subsequent 14.1% rate hikes for the following four years, Taxpayers’ Union Head of Campaigns, Callum Purves, said:

“While Hamilton City Council might be trying hard to sell the idea that there is no other choice when it comes to funding its water infrastructure, it’s evident that the financial crisis it now finds itself in has been driven by years of wasteful spending.

“Just last year, our 2023 Ratepayers Report revealed the Council had spent over $315m on contractors and consultants – more than three times that of Auckland Council – and pays nearly a quarter of its staff salaries over $100,000. It’s that there is still plenty of fat the Council could trim to allow investment in vital infrastructure while protecting ratepayers from eye-watering rate hikes.

“Double-digit rate hikes have become a worrying trend across New Zealand’s local councils and now you’d be hard-pressed to find any council with a rate increase below the level of inflation. It’s high time our local authorities start cutting back on the nice-to-haves and stop expecting ratepayers to keep bailing them out."

Wellington City councillors have been given advice recommending they alter the district plan to prevent housing intensification across huge swathes of the city.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Policy and Public Affairs Manager, James Ross, said:

“Wellington is deep in a housing crisis, and whether you’re looking to buy or rent there simply is not enough to go around. Prices are skyrocketing, and the only solution to this is to build more homes.

“Red tape has stifled development for decades. The crisis won’t end without serious RMA reform from central government, but that doesn’t mean the council can’t make it worse. The advice given to councillors would push Wellington’s housing market to breaking point.

“Wellingtonians need rooves over their heads, and so the city needs to build up and build out. As much as the council might like to try and bury its head in the sand, not building at all is not an option.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is slamming Selwyn District Council for proposing a 16% rate hike in the first stage of a cumulative 45.89% rates hike over three years.

“Yet again we are seeing a council completely fail to be prudent with its spending proposals, and is now asking its already-burdened ratepayers for an extra arm and a leg to bail them out,” Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager, Connor Molloy, says.

“From a council that just last year was able to keep its rates increase under the level of inflation to now looking at dropping double-digit rate hikes for the next three successive years is an unacceptable turn of events that has blind-sided Selwyn’s ratepayers.

“The council should be tightening their belt like households all across the district are forced to do when costs rise. This includes trimming the fat in the Council’s back office bureaucracy, letting go of gold-plated vanity projects and seriously considering the sale of under-utilised or unnecessary assets.”

Commenting on the news that Nicola Willis’ office failed to respond to a joint letter from accomodation providers requesting an urgent meeting over plans to introduce an App Tax from April this year, Taxpayers’ Union Policy Adviser, James Ross, said:

“A bit of backbone from the National Party wouldn’t go amiss. Their own campaigns from last year prove that they know how damaging the App Tax will be to Kiwi consumers and businesses alike.

“Whether the meeting request got lost in an administrative mix-up is irrelevant. National’s own messaging shows that they already knew the facts laid out in this letter.

“It’s easy to sling stones from opposition, but National protecting Labour’s unsustainable high-tax legacy is failing the voters who put their faith in the party at the ballot box.

“Rather than taxing hardworking Kiwis out of being able to afford a summer junket, the Government needs to get serious about slashing Wellington’s over-bloated bureaucracy to plug the fiscal gap.”

Reacting to the Government’s announcement that they are withdrawing a bill from the previous Government that would have lowered the voting age for local body elections to 16, Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager, Connor Molloy, said:

“Changes to the rules of the game in any democracy should be decided by the people, not by politicians who have the incentive to screw the scrum in their favour.

“While reasonable minds can differ on the merits of lowering the voting age, introducing such a significant piece of legislation in the dying days of Parliament and closing submissions just six days after the general election is nothing more than bad-faith electoral reform.

“Proponents of lowering the voting age should work to win over public support before any bill is introduced in the future and allow the decision to be made by voters, not self-interested politicians.”

The Taxpayers’ Union is throwing its weight behind calls for the powers of Tauranga’s unelected Commissioners to be curtailed in the run-up to the return of democracy to the city, and urges Local Government Minister Simeon Brown to step in.

Commenting on this, Taxpayers’ Union Policy Adviser, James Ross, said:

“Unelected Commissioners in Tauranga have spent years tossing around ratepayers’ money with reckless abandon, all safe in the knowledge that they will never be accountable to the rate-paying public.

“Although it is three-and-a-half years too late, democracy will be returning to Tauranga this year; the Commissioners cannot be allowed to put that in jeopardy. The long-term plan will set the city’s course for the next decade, and this must only be decided by the elected representatives of Tauranga residents.

“We’re already seeing the damage at a national level that an outgoing government can inflict by signing long-term contracts that they know will be overturned. This is damaging to both business confidence and to the public’s back pockets, and this cannot be allowed to be inflicted on the city by Commissioners without an electoral mandate.”

Commenting on Christchurch City Council’s plans to bid to host the Commonwealth Games, Taxpayers’ Union Policy Adviser, James Ross, said: 

“Mayor Phil Mauger wants to show the world that Christchurch is back on its feet. But he’d be better off proving this to Christchurch residents first. 

“With the Council group neck deep in around $25,000 in debt per residential ratepayer and expected rates rises well into the double figures, Christchurch is in no position to be throwing billions of dollars in ratepayers’ hard-earned money into the wind on games which have already been canned across the ditch for proving far too expensive.

“Whilst core infrastructure like the Pages Road Bridge is still to be fully repaired following the earthquake, the Council even considering wasting billions on exorbitant vanity projects is an insult to the residents who have worked so hard to bring their city back from the brink.” 

The Taxpayers’ Union is astounded at the failure of Kāinga Ora to deliver for Kiwis with reports of more than 1000 empty new homes sitting empty for four months last year.

Commenting on Kainga Ora’s vacant properties, Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager, Connor Molloy, said:

“At a time when tens of thousands of applicants are stuck on the housing register, there is no reason why any new homes that are perfectly ready to be used should not be filled as soon as possible.

“As has been evident for years, many of these vacant properties are only collecting dust, and racking up millions in maintenance costs while they go unused. Kāinga Ora needs to get its act together and start delivering Kiwis with more efficient and timely access to housing.

“It is also clear that wider reform of Kāinga Ora is needed. The Government will never deliver houses as cheaply or efficiently as the private sector so they should instead focus on reducing the barriers to build and rent properties while also helping those with genuine need to find suitable private accomodation."

Hot on the heels of Argentinian President Javier Milei insisting on honesty from Argentinian officials, the Taxpayers’ Union has today launched a petition calling on the Government to ban public servants from using the word free when referring to taxpayer-funded public services.

Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns Manager, Connor Molloy, said:

“Describing public services as ‘free’ when New Zealanders all across the country are paying for them through their taxes is misleading and deceptive.

“There are strong arguments for the taxpayer to cover the costs of some services upfront, but to dishonestly label those services as free is disrespectful to the hardworking Kiwis footing the bill. It is political disinformation, and it’s time it stopped.

“Words have power. Government agencies misleading Kiwis erodes public trust in our institutions.”