Why two small councils are on opposite ends of the amalgamation debate

As the government pushes councils to put forward amalgamation plans by August, two small councils are at opposite ends of the debate.

Local Government Minister Simon Watts and RMA Reform Minister Chris Bishop announced the move in May, giving a three-month deadline for reorganisation plans to be delivered. If councils failed to make use of the new 'Head Start' approach, they would be forced into changes.

Southland District mayor Rob Scott told Nine to Noon on Tuesday his council had spent two years already building a plan to amalgamate with neighbouring Gore and to take on the regional council functions of their areas.

Meanwhile in Ōpōtiki, mayor David Moore was questioning the value of amalgamation - saying smaller councils had achieved a lot and kept rates down.

Scott said Southland was split up into three territorial authorities, with Southland District Council occupying most of that land.

"We've found there is a lot of duplication, confusion and inefficiencies so that was the main driver for us to simplify how that worked."

At the moment, he said there was "this almost fake line in the sand of what we look after and what the regional council looks after."

Scott said Invercargill City Council believed there should be just one council for all of Southland but he believed it should stand alone.

"You've got 1 percent of the land area with 56 percent of the population. We don't have an urban, rural divide at the moment, but my fear is under one council we'll create a rural, urban divide... with decisions based on what's best for urban."

Southland was basically a provider of infrastructure across the area, Scott said, with 21,000 ratepayers, the same number of wastewater plants as Auckland and 71 public toilets.

He believed the fundamental issues for local government was how it was funded.

"Until we address funding for it nationwide we're not actually going to resolve anything."

Scott did have some reservations over the government's Headstart plan as he said he had been working on his own plan for years and there would be a high cost for the transition.

For Southland he believed it made sense as there wasn't duplication between what the city council did but as soon as teams in other regions were merged together it could risk "bloating out bureaucracy".

Moore told Nine to Noon, he would "see" if his region could get to the August deadline set by the council.

"I'm pushing back on this whole thing," he said, "it's just ridiculous the timeframe they've given.

"Every district is different and we're one of the smallest councils."

He said what made sense for bigger communities, like Tauranga, was not the same for smaller ones and he worried those views would not be taken into account.

"We have a town versus country divide already. We've seen the affects of centralisation."

He said there was a push for "one huge super council" for the Bay of Plenty and Ōpōtiki would only make up roughly 3 percent of that.

"So our representation would be next to zero. You will have a divide between the two communities."

Moore said representation would be lost and rates wouldn't be cheaper.

"The obvious thing is to work with those [councils] who are ready to do this. Fix up the ones that need fixing, see how it goes.

"The timeframe given is just ridiculous. At the speed they've ordered us to do we would be absolutely hammered."