Call to cut jobs ‘unrealistic’
The scale of a proposal to cut jobs at Hamilton City Council by 7% is not worth the “destruction it will cause”, says a councillor.
But one of the elected members behind the proposal has hit back, slamming some councillors for their “self-serving rhetoric” and “selective narrative“.
The suggestion to slash the council’s payroll by 7% as well as a 10% cut to the consultant budget was tabled by councillors Ewan Wilson and Emma Pike at this week’s budget meeting for the draft 2024-32 Long-Term Plan, where it passed 8-6. That would lead to savings of $10.4m in year 3, and a total of $104m over 10 years, council documents say.
Councillors also grappled with a potential 25.5% rates rise before settling on 19.9%. But the rate rises would keep coming, with the city projecting rises of 15.5% for the four years following.
Councillor Sarah Thomson and deputy mayor Angela O’Leary both expressed concerns about the proposal to cut numbers, with Thomson describing it as “unrealistic” and “unfeasible”.
Thomson said she had gone through the list of reductions councillors had previously been provided with, looking specifically for all the cuts that could be made that would reduce staffing numbers and costs.
“You add that all up and you get $4 million in opex [operational expenditure] savings. That doesn’t even get us close to the $10 million.”
The council was already looking at carving out a 7.75% reduction to staffing roles under the Future Fit programme so Wilson’s proposal “would be another 7% reduction on top of this”.
“More specifically, 68 roles have already been cut in tranche one. We haven’t been through tranche two yet but, between the two tranches, it will end up in total a minimum reduction of 100.”
Further cuts would impact council services, Thomson said – for example reduced hours at the Gallagher pool.
Thomson referenced cuts made during Julie Hardaker’s tenure as mayor of Hamilton between 2010 and 2016, saying some of those services had “just never recovered”.
On rate hikes, Thomson said: “I think that there has been a real issue with council keeping rates artificially low and borrowing to make up the difference, particularly in this last year when we had high inflation and it's caught up with us.”
O’Leary, who first elected to council in 2007, also mentioned the 2012 cuts, lamenting the city hadn’t really recovered.
“They cut quite deep back then and it wasn’t anywhere near the level of this proposal from Councillor Wilson. $10 million is a significant amount every year so this is why I am super concerned about it.
“History tells us as well that when we do these exercises it’s always out of the community – libraries, swimming pools and community development stuff – that gets looked at first.
“I know Sarah’s done some work on the $10 million and literally even if we close all of the libraries and did all of the cuts that have been on the table in the past we still don’t even reach that $10 million so it’s a pretty serious amount.”
Another concern was asking the community if they wanted to cut services without giving ratepayers any indication of what those services might be. “History will repeat itself if we go down this track but we’ve never gutted the organisation of services we deliver to the community by this amount with absolutely no information to support it at this stage”.
In response, Wilson said he didn’t think anyone in their right mind would get any enjoyment from suggesting job cuts that could turn people’s lives upside down. “But the reality is the size and scale of council is bigger than what council can afford to deliver unless council keeps putting up the rates. And the ratepayers are saying ‘hey, we’ve got a problem, you’re rating us out of our homes’.”
The financial predicament that council has found itself in was decades in the making and ultimately the ratepayers would decide, he said.
Wilson said he had put forward multiple strategies trying to reduce costs but each one had been rejected.
The suggestion ratepayers would not understand what cuts to payroll could mean was “being unkind to the average intelligence of the ratepayer”, Wilson said, particularly as it would go out to consultation in May and again as part of the annual plan.
“So to say that the people are not going to be able to have a meaningful input and they're not going to be able to have enough detail is self-serving rhetoric that I don't believe is accurate because people will have lots of opportunity.
“And when we've worked out some of the more detailed suggestions, we're going to go out and consult with them again.”
He thought O’Leary and Thomson were more worried ratepayers would tell them their “pet projects” couldn’t be funded.
“If I was in their shoes and I was trying to promote projects that are unpalatable, you know, I'd be saying, oh, they won't fully understand, right? The ratepayers aren't silly.”
“I think there has been a real issue with council keeping rates artificially low ...”
Sarah Thomson