He says "It's not accurate to say that just because your council loses 30,000 people you have to raise rates", but there is only one instance of an existing Council being smaller (Stirling, by 30,000, strangely enough) after the changes than before.
What most discussion is about, including from Lisa Scaffidi about whose statements I have been very scathing, is that if you amalgamate two or more areas that have different rate levels, then some will pay more and some less after amalgamation to produce the same total rate revenue. In many cases the differentials are so great that this will be so even if the yet-to-be-demonstrated financial efficiencies are actually achieved.
And it would hardly aid the cause of creating a new sense of community to maintain existing rate differentials services that would be the same across the whole area.
As for saying that councils "could not know how merger arrangements would affect their financial situations", we have seen nothing that remotely suggests that HS or CP have any idea, either.
No wonder the pair of them are intent on removing the rights we have to make submissions on amalgamation proposals or, ultimately, to vote on them. They know - and we know - that the community is being asked to by the proverbial pig in a poke.
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