Invercargill City Councillors have voted to remove one of the mayor’s official listed engagements included in his mayoral report, with some saying it was unnecessary and showed political bias. 

Mayor Tim Shadbolt included Invercargill National party candidate Penny Simmonds’s election night function in his list of official mayoral engagements for September and October in his Mayor’s report tabled yesterday – something that Cr Lesley Soper was not happy with.

“This council is an apolitical body, we are a mutual body, this council is not elected on party tickets that has been a record of more than 75 years,” she said.

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“I am therefore somewhat horrified to see one election night function for one political party attended by yourself listed on your official mayoral engagements.”

The Mayor’s report was discussed at yesterday’s(October 27) full council meeting.

Mayor Tim Shadbolt explained that he had attended the national party event in a personal capacity. 

“I was really there as an ambassador for [Southern Institute of Technology] Zero Fees and the work I just feel [Penny Simmonds] has done, I just feel she has done more for this city than any other leader.”

He then asked whether his name had been mentioned in any media articles saying he had attended the political function. 

But Cr Soper said that was not the point.

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“We are a mutual council that works with all political parties and with a government that is elected.”

She also made the point that he should have waited before appointing Cr Nobby Clark as the new deputy mayor in a “rush”.

“I do wish to comment on your rush to use section 41A(3) of Local Government Act to appoint to appoint the vacancy of the deputy mayor [Toni Biddle], I think this is an unwise move at this time,” she said.

She said the mayor should have waited “until the DIA investigative report was available”.

The Department of Internal Affairs has requested an independent evaluation on the standard of governance at Invercargill City Council. The report is being prepared by independent evaluator Richard Thompson and it was due to be presented to the full council at the end of this month, but it appears to be running slightly behind schedule. 

Cr Alex Crackett agreed with Cr Soper, saying she thought the Mayor should have waited for the DIA report, which could have helped him make a more informed decision. 

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The debate of whether the Mayor should have included Penny Simmonds’s candidate party as an official mayoral function went on for around 15 minutes until Cr Nigel Skelt piped up saying the continued discussion was a waste of time. 

“Team, I was at a 51-year-old’s funeral today and we are discussing the agenda item of His Worship the Mayor. We’ve got a lot to do, can we please move forward?”

Cr Soper then moved that the engagement was removed from his mayoral report.

It was seconded by Cr Ian Pottinger. 

Cr Lesley Abbot then added that he felt the council was spending too much time debating petty issues.

“I just make the observation that we spent three minutes on spending 4.7 million dollars… but we’ve spent 15 minutes on a petty item like this.”

Councillors then voted in favour of removing the item from the mayoral report.