Local Government in Tasmania: Does it have a future?

There are heaps of money in Tasmania that are just waiting to be liberated. Over $700 million is tied up in 29 Local Councils who, along with an Upper and Lower house, serve a population of about 500,000. 

It is worth asking the question "why do we need 29 local governments...in fact why do we need any local governments? Can't the services that they provide be carried out more effectively, indeed more efficiently, corporately?"

Instead of amalgamating Councils into larger units, why can't we just get rid of them? 

We only need to decide what local activities are worth carrying out, then the State government could put works out to tender and have the private sector carry them out. 

Penalty clauses for failure to carry out the work, and shifting the contract to other providers provide reasonable protection. 

Local companies or individuals could carry out routine maintenance like edge clearing and mowing. Instead of Councils collecting rates – nobody would need to collect them because they'd be included in State government monies. 

The State government has the required mechanisms. The 'requirement' for hundreds of millions to be spent on routine and perfunctory administration would virtually disappear. Money that would have been locked into self-servicing Council bureaucracies could largely be diverted to local communities and businesses and/or their representative peak bodies. 

Community and area representation could also be achieved through community meetings with whatever government department was managing the contracts. Decisions could still be made by vote. 

Instead submitting to often-times ill equipped nay-saying Council planners, architects and builders could be accredited so that their work automatically complied with regulatory requirements. Some of this already happens. 

Social media and community meetings could relatively easily replace council meetings, community consultation processes. 

Those who will be missed are the producers of the reams of deliberately mind-numbing bureaucratic paperwork for tedious meetings that achieve virtually nothing. 

Those who revel in this mindless and unproductive nonsense could watch the shopping channels for a couple of hours each day instead. 

Removing Councils would: 

• Unlock the creative potential of citizens; 
• Allow local initiatives to move at a normal (as opposed to snail) pace); and 
• Lower costs of government by getting rid of the entire bottom tier. 

Tasmania is great place to test ideas like this and prove their veracity given its size. Apart from anything else this is an idea that needs to be tested as the current system is costing way too much and its broken.

Dr HJ Bauer & Dr R Barton 2014