Dr WTF

Time and again we find ourselves penning a "Civics 101" lecture in order to counter the misleading spin put out by Michael Laws, and this post is no exception. So apologies in advance to those readers who have already cottoned on to the basic precepts of democracy. We're obliged to do this occasionally to help out those who have not (Mickey, Dotty and the dwarves, the entire editorial staff of the Chron and a smattering of LW commenters).

What's sparked this latest lecture is Mickey's tired drum-banging about the previous Council's supposed "financial slackness", as Dave Laurence termed it in a Chron story recently.

Leaving aside for the moment that Mickey has quite a few "control weaknesses" of his own, the Mayoral hyperbole that the report was "one of the worst he had seen in his 20 years in the public sector" was allowed through without so much as a question.

Those readers who were waiting for the Chron to ask the obvious, like "how does that tally with the horrific scare stories you keep telling us about Auckland's pending 200 percent rates rise, then?" were sorely disappointed.

But more importantly, the fearless guardian of Wanganui's fourth estate allowed the Mayor to get away with saying he considered that "the audit was saying to elected representatives that they were responsible for the council's financial management".

Errr, no. Not unless the Audit Office has lost all touch with reality. Because as just about any Year 9 student who's been paying attention in social studies can tell you, the elected representatives on any body set policy and employ a chief executive who carries the can for financial management.

Now then Watchers. Sit up straight, pay attention, and open no less an authority than the Local Government Association's useful handbook for those who weren't paying attention at school:

Generally the council:

• sets major policy (including strategic, annual and district plans, long-term financial strategies and funding policies)
• appoints and monitors the performance of the chief executive
• approves major contracts
• determines the council’s committee structure, membership and delegations
• builds iwi relationships
• makes decisions on matters that aren’t delegated to committees or council staff.

Still not convinced? Then let's see what we can ascertain from the Council's own Governance Policy:

The Chief Executive is appointed by the Council in accordance with section 42 and clauses 33 and 34 of Schedule 7 of the Local Government Act 2002. The Chief Executive implements and manages the Council’s policies and objectives within the budgetary constraints established by the Council. Under section 42 of the Local Government Act 2002, the responsibilities of the Chief Executive are:

• implementing the decisions of the Council
• providing advice to members of the Council and Community Boards
• ensuring that all responsibilities, duties and powers delegated to the Chief Executive or to any person employed by the Wanganui District Council, or imposed or conferred by any Act, regulation or bylaw are properly performed or exercised
• ensuring the effective and efficient management of the activities of Wanganui District Council
• maintaining systems to enable effective planning and accurate reporting of the financial and service performance of the Council
• providing leadership for the staff of the Council
• employing staff, including negotiation of the terms of employment for the staff, of the Wanganui District Council

Mr Whitlock, of course, got out while the going was good so is unlikely to be called to account for any perceived failing to perform any of those functions. And pillorying him wouldn't score Mickey any cheap political points anyway.

But let us return to the Chron's unasked questions. Right after they'd let Mickey bang on for column centimetre afer column centimetre lamenting "the system which the incoming council inherited" which was "manifestly inadequate and grossly deficient, exposing the organisation to risk", we get given a few examples, one of which is:

There was a hand slap for the district library’s "unders and overs" account, which arose from discrepancies between cash banked and cash sales entered into the accounting system.

Hold on... a financial stuff up at the library? On such a basic level as accurately recording cash receipts? (Note: the Audit Office said there was no indication of fraud. Which just leaves incompetence). But hasn't the person responsible for the library at the time, on whose desk the buck stopped (or, it seems, in this case didn't stop) just been... promoted by Mickey?

Was the Chron not aware of this? Was Mr Laurence asleep, leaving his tape recorder to faithfully record the Mayoral rant? Or did he just rehash a Guyton Street press release and allow Mr Maslin to run it under his byline? We'd concude by asking, rhetorically, "have they no shame?". But we suspect we know the answer to that, as do most of you.

Off topic admin note: Thanks to those Watchers who raised the issue of the difficulty they had locating LawsWatch in the ever-growing world wide web. We can be found by typing "Laws Watch" into most search engines, but otherwise it has been difficult. We've taken some technical steps to remedy this in the past few weeks, and the results should slowly become evident in search engines etc. We'd also encourage supporters to add the blog's address to their email-signatures, to tell their friends about it (just tell them to Google "Laws Watch") and - if you're really that keen - to take up the suggestion of posting flyers etc. But please - remain with the law and use common sense.

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