ACT leader David Seymour says the party is seeking expressions of interest from New Zealanders to stand for their local council under the the party’s banner.
This would mark the first time ACT has sought to put forward candidates in local government elections
Speaking to Breakfast this morning, Seymour said the party had strong values of “saving money, letting people be free to choose and treating people equally”, and wanted the community to see this reflected in local councillors.
“I think a lot of people might say ‘I want someone like that in my community, so that when I tick the box for my local council, I know what I’m getting’,” he said.
He said during his time in parliament as an electorate MP people have often brought up issues that he said were “actually a decision your council made”.
“Too often people say to me, look, I get the little booklet from my council [and] I don’t really know the names, I don’t know what I’m getting, but I tick the box out of my civic duty.
“I suspect that there’s a lot of people who would say ‘look, actually I want a bit more certainty [of] what I’m getting.”
He urged anyone in cities who wanted to “stand under the ACT banner and people who believe in those values” to put their names forward.
ACT would not be putting forward candidates for mayoral positions.
Speaking alongside ACT’s local government spokesperson Cameron Luxton, Seymour said he wanted councils that delivered, and that currently councils were trying to do “far too many things for far too many people”.
“While in reality they have leaky pipes, clogged roads, not enough parking, too many vanity projects that aren’t actually making the proverbial boat go faster. That is a core ACT value, get the Government focused on things that can make a difference to ratepayers and save ratepayers money.”
He said the party would champion their local government candidates to focus on transport.
“People who want lower rates and less social engineering, they need a brand they can vote for. Just as the left — the people who want higher rates and more social engineering seem to have someone to vote for — I think the rest of us should do too.”
Seymour said prospective politicians had seven months to put together a proposition, and was tight-lipped on whether anyone had officially thrown their name in.
“We’ve had discussions with them, and obviously we’re not going to tell everyone who they are straightaway. We’ll be checking them out and they’ll be checking us out, and in a month or two we’ll have an idea if this is on, or [whether it’s] a good idea that maybe it’s better for another time.”
Local elections will be held later this year.
