Council Still Lacking in Some Areas, Legacy Report Says

The Invercargill City Council is now in a good position to push ahead on its own, without the support of external appointees brought in by the Department of Internal Affairs.

Adviser to the office of the chief executive Jane Parfitt read some of the findings of the final Legacy Report, which outlined how council had taken ownership of its problems, since they first arose in mid-2020.

A Project Governance Group was formed and chaired by deputy Mayor Nobby Clark, and a ‘Working on Working Together’ report was made.

The Legacy Report says that council has delivered on five of the seven outcomes but there was still work to do on leadership.

A resident survey in Invercargill also found that the council had work to do to transform it into a more functioning one.

Mayor Tim Shadbolt continues to struggle with running a meeting, without direct intervention from CEO Clare Hadley, and today he had issues with moving a motion to receive the report.

Deputy Mayor Nobby Clark asked if he could intervene when His Worship voted against receiving the report, “so we’re not cracking a bit of a circus situation,” he told the meeting.

In the final straw Mayor Tim also moved the recommendations but voted against them, which one councillor described as “a bit like ordering a pizza and then throwing it in the red bin,” to put some humour into the situation.

Nobby also shared at the end of the meeting, as chair of the PPG group, that Mayor Tim twice publicly said he felt uneasy about council because they were suing him, but His Worship declined to elaborate.

“I would rather not go there,” he said.  Nobby said he understood that quite the opposite was happening, and it was in fact Tim who was suing the council.

Mayor Tim gained some control back of the meeting by acknowledging the external support.

“It’s certainly been a trial by fire and it’s hard to put it out.  A bit like the wetlands really.”

“I think it shows your resilience and we appreciate that you have all hung in there to the bitter end.”

The CEO will now provide the Department of Internal Affairs with a copy of the Legacy Report and request a response from them for council to consider at its next meeting on May 24.