You’d hardly know there was a local body election campaign aside from election hoardings up around the place.
Besides the widespread disillusionment with politics and politicians (“They’re all shit” said one woman to me at the Otara market yesterday) there are other media driven circuses which offer more entertainment such as the America’s Cup, the rugby tests and the Labour leadership contest each of which has been given copious coverage well in excess of any democratic local body debate.
In the case of the Auckland mayoralty where (declaration of interest – I’m standing as the Mana Movement candidate) the campaign has been dominated by a vacuum of intelligent debate.
As I see it, and as the public increasingly perceives it, the campaign is very much a battle between Len Brown’s record as a worthy representative of the 1% and Mana’s big bold ideas to challenge inequality and make a dramatic difference to the lives of families in low and middle income communities.
To illustrate the point I’ll leave you to consider this comparison:
|
In a John Minto led council |
In a Len Brown led council |
| Free buses and trains, no new roads, an end to traffic congestion | Expensive buses and trains, more roads, more traffic congestion |
| Build 20,000 affordable council rental homes | Build 39,000 unaffordable homes |
| Rent Controls – affordable housing | Market rents – unaffordable housing |
| Glen Innes: Stop the redevelopment – housing for low-income families | Glen Innes: Evict low-income families -more housing for the wealthy |
| Living wage for all council employees and in all council contracts | Living wage “in principle” for council employees |
| End contracting of council services – cut out the middle men | Keep contracting council services – more money to the middle men |
| Council initiatives to provide jobs | No council initiatives on jobs |
| Standing with the port workers | Standing with the port company bully |
| Income related rates – fair to everyone | Property based rates – unfair to people on fixed incomes |
| Scrap council charges | Keep hammering low-income families with water, rubbish and universal charges |
| No more pokies for the casino | 230 more pokies and 40 more gaming tables |
| Rates burden reduced on low and fixed income families | Rates burden increased on low and middle income families – lower rates for businesses |
| Community power to close pokies, liquor, fast food and loan-shark operations | Community “consultation” but no community power. |
| Sustainable community renewal | Unsustainable growth – one million more people in next 30 years. |
| Palestinian solidarity – end Veolia contract | No Palestinian solidarity – keep Transdev contract |
| A Mayor for the people | A Mayor for big business |
Authorised by John Minto, 4 Ethel Street, Morningside, Auckland.
How will your income related rates work?
An environmentally focused, people orientated mayor with a genuine sense of social justice. You go John. You have our vote in this household.
Income related rates aren’t fair, for example you have two couples who are neighbors, one couple decides to work overtime and weekends in order to increase their income so they can pay off their mortgage and the other couple decide not to. You end up penalizing the hard working couple who have a greater income due to their efforts and their sacrifices to better themselves have all been in vain.
I’m thinking that they may assess rates based on aggregated revenue for that specific household less taxes paid, divided by hours worked multiplied by normalised rate of hours (average over a qualified period for example 38 weeks) adding a specific margin as a tax efficiency buffer – a type of accounting covalency for proper (lawful, usual and average) income – many people work more than 40 hours on minimum wage yet do not reap the fruit of their labours – God knows I’ve had my time doing so.
It should be a flat rate based on the services used. You should not be penalized just because you earn more than your neighbor. Your house might have cost more or require more repairs etc, hence why you might be working longer hours or put the effort in the secure that next promotion.
Those who are very wealthy generally arrange their finances so they appear to have a ridiculously low income.
Minto for Mayor!
Mana up & Mana Hard…
Forget the rest, they have failed hard working low and middle income families. Mana is the only party on common ground that genuinely work for the interests of working class communities.
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