Environment Canterbury chair Peter Scott has resumed his role unopposed, after voluntarily stepping aside earlier this year while a compliance investigation on his farming activities was undertaken.
Following the conclusion of the independent investigation earlier this month, Scott was one of three parties issued a formal warning after determination that his irrigation and land use activities were of low environmental impact and did not meet the threshold for prosecution, with the appropriate land use consent for the property now being processed.
Scott was consequently declared “free to resume his role” as chair of the regional council and, following discussion with fellow councillors, he did this at the meeting of the council on July 24.
Decisions at this same meeting have proposed a restructure of constituency boundaries as well as a governance shake-up.
A key feature of the shake-up is the proposal for a change in representation arrangements ahead of the 2025 and 2028 local body elections.
The council locked in its proposal, which retains the existing overall structure for representation, but with changes to the boundaries of the current Mid Canterbury/ Ōpākihi and South Canterbury/Ōtuhituhi constituencies.
This means the Ashburton district, effectively stuck in the middle, would be combined with South Canterbury to form an expanded Mid-South Canterbury constituency.
The Selwyn district would form its own constituency, Selwyn/Waikirikiri.
The second option put to council was for the status quo to remain.
In a close 9-7 vote councillors moved in favour of the reshuffle, of which the four rural councillor representatives from the two impacted constituencies all voted against, with suggestion councillors think about the constituencies in terms of scale, not just population.
Formal public consultation on the proposed representation structure changes will open on August 2 2024, from which some strong challenges are anticipated.
Meanwhile, some key governance changes were also cemented.
The council has agreed on a new committee structure that streamlines Environment Canterbury’s (ECan) business and focus on its three core services.
At the council meeting the existing five current standing committees were formally discharged and two new standing committees created.
The new strategy and policy committee will provide advice and report back to the council on the development of positions or approaches on current or emerging issues of local, regional and national significance.
The regional delivery committee will have governance oversight of the organisation’s delivery, including the three core services.
It will receive performance and financial reporting at the core service level.
All councillors will be members of both committees.
The council voted to defer appointing chairs and deputy chairs, and appointment of councillors to lead core service roles for the regional delivery committee, until the next council meeting.
The council also discussed enhancing public awareness of council decision-making.
This work stems from the Ombudsman’s 2023 report Open for Business: A Report on the Chief Ombudsman’s investigation into local council meetings and workshops. Some of the ways the council will be doing this include making all briefings and workshops public by default and live-streaming council meetings, briefings and workshops where practicable, by the end of the year.
