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NZTU Media
· November 08, 2023 12:03 PM
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This week on Taxpayer Talk, Taxpayers' Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, sits down with lawyer Stephen Franks to provide an update on the Three Waters legal challenge. Stephen is a founding director of the commercial and public law firm Franks Ogilvie, a former member of Parliament and spokesperson for the Water Users' Group.
Franks Ogilvie has been leading the legal challenge against Three Waters that, among other things, aimed to force the Minister of Local Government, Nanaia Mahuta, to release her legal advice that co-governance of Three Waters infrastructure was required under the Treaty of Waitangi. Unfortunately, this challenge was unsuccessful and was appealed to the Court of Appeal where the challenge was again dismissed. We have decided to drop the case in order to focus our resources and efforts on developing a repeal and replacement bill for Three Waters.
The Local Water Infrastructure Bill that we have been developing addresses the infrastructure issues that were used as the justification for Three Waters but without the co-governance, seizure of local assets and other numerous problems in the Three Waters legislation. You can read about our Local Water Infrastructure Bill here.
The Court of Appeal judgment can be read here.
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Not Saying
· July 15, 2014 2:10 PM
Stephen Franks blogs:
The moot for the New Zealand Initiative's youth debate semi-final this year in Wellington is a good one -
"Should New Zealand tie MPs' and Ministers' salaries to a multiple of the average national income?"
When the Remuneration Authority was asking MPs about reform of the system 10 years ago, I urged that:
a) Parties be given a material amount they could distribute among their members according to their pre-Parliament incomes, to do three things:
- reduce the income cut involved in going to Parliament for people for whom there is much more to lose, and
- reduce the overpayment of the kind or people who would never be thought useful enough outside Parliament to get anywhere near their Parliamentary income, so they don't cling quite so desperately to their places; and
- have the supplement reduce each year after entry to Parliament, to encourage turnover of people who have not progressed.
I also suggested a trailing commission, to induce longer term thinking among MPs. Exec incentive schemes that fail to add a trailing element or to defer vesting encourage manipulation of reporting and incentivise short term results. In politics that there is already more than enough incentive for false reporting and short-temism, in the 3 year electoral cycle.
Accordingly MPs should have a material part of their remuneration deferred each year. If the MP demands immediate payment is should be substantially discounted. The deferred amount (say half) might be paid out say five years later, multiplied by 2 times or 5 times the GDP or average income growth in the five years. If it shifted MPs horizons, it would be money incredibly well spent even if they tripled or quadrupled their incomes.
For an even longer perspective, simply make the deferral period longer.
From the taxpayers' perspective, paying MPs a little more, if it resulted in better performance is a no brainer. How would you structure it though? Drop us a line, or comment on our Facebook page.