Comments on: Gerrymandering Auckland city

By: illuminatedtiger

illuminatedtiger — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 07:39:34 +0000

This is the same shit the Republican Party pulled in the US. Shameful shameful Nats!

By: Steve

Steve — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 06:12:21 +0000

BLip,
Parks and Libraries, but does the deal include The Bridge?
The Bridge could be a money maker. It has paid for itself more than twice.

By: Rich

Rich — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 05:13:35 +0000

The drawing of the boundaries to reflect communities of interest is arguably as important as the population ratios.

I’d argue it isn’t – if you don’t have a council elected that represents how people voted, it isn’t democracy.

FPP intrinsically produces unrepresentative results, *even* if the electorates are of equal sizes. Not doing that makes it worse, and tweaking the electorates to over-represent the bluer rural areas is a pretty obvious gerrymander.

By: Rich

Rich — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 05:00:36 +0000

It’s all in the plan to elect an ACT council when they only have maybe 6% support in auckland?

Firstly, Rodney and Franklin are only in the supershitty to provide guaranteed National voting fodder.

Then they give extra councillors to the right-leaning voters in the outer burbs and take them away from the left-leaning voters in central, south and west Auckland.

Count the whole thing using FPP, so that if City Vision get 45% in Howick, those votes get thrown away.

And “elect” a Lord Mayor using the same FPP beauty contest, so that Banks or Holmes can get in on 40% of the votes with the centre-left vote split.

Joh Bjelke-Petersen would be proud!

By: Bored

Bored — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 03:11:12 +0000

Wodders fetish with 20 starts with the relative youth of his women compared to his age, maybe he is just stuck on that number.

By: BLiP

BLiP — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:47:07 +0000

Heh! Yeah.

I see the privatisation of public space has already started. The choice bits are being sliced up even before the legislation is through.

By: lprent

lprent — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:45:15 +0000

Yes and that is the logic that says if you’re going to have a smallish council, then it should be around 25 people. Rodney Hide has never explained his fetish with 20 which has complicated the debate ever since this government effectively rejected the recommendations of the royal commission and put in this jury-rigged gerrymander.

By: Lanthanide

Lanthanide — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:40:42 +0000

If you accept that Rodney and Franklin should each get their own councillor, doing the maths shows that the average population/councillor should be 58,620, dividing the remaining population gives 22 councillors + the 2 from Rodney and Franklin for a total of 24 councillors.

24 seems like a nice round number to me, and would only be an extra 20% increase in direct costs over having 20 councillors.

By: tc

tc — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:19:47 +0000

I love the arrogance Wodders continues to display with the ‘I know best, so shut up’ approach, so democratic, consulative and predictable.

The trick will be to ensure this pile of stench says at JK’s door as he’ll try to shovel it onto ACT…….then watch the handbags fly as Wodger finally awakes from his grandpa snooze to do whatever it is that he does.

By: Bored

Bored — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:12:43 +0000

You forgot to mention the terms “cut price’ and “fire sale”. Wodders trying to out Prebble Prebble with our silver.

By: BLiP

BLiP — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 00:06:54 +0000

For Sale: One city, barely used, many parks and libraries, going cheap. Contact Citizens And ratepayers.