West Coast Regional Council deputy chair Stuart Challenger has confirmed that he is prepared to lead the council if chair Allan Birchfield is unseated as planned.
Stuart Challenger, right, wants Allan Birchfield removed from his role as chair of West Coast Regional Council. Photo: West Coast Regional Council
Challenger has led the charge to roll Birchfield at a special meeting on 31 May, and he has the numbers to do it, with councillors Deborah Magner, John Hill and Laura Coll McLaughlin supporting the change.
Challenger told the Greymouth Star this morning the most urgent issue confronting the council was the need to draw a clear line between governance and management.
"It's a matter of staying on the right side of that line. It will be easier to achieve that if Allan is a councillor rather than the chair," he said.
Emails obtained by the Greymouth Star showed chief executive Vin Smith, who is on unexplained leave, recently asked for legal advice after being subjected to what he described as regular "rants" by the chair about resource consent decisions.
Birchfield was unapologetic when asked to comment today.
He had challenged recent staff decisions that temporarily closed down demolition jobs in Greymouth, because they defied common sense and created health and safety issues, he said.
"I also told Vin in one of my 'rants' that we would have to look at taking the prosecution decisions back into council ... a few years ago we delegated them to staff but I threatened to take them back because of this nonsense."
Allan Birchfield is unapologetic over "rants" to the council's chief executive. Photo: LDR / Lois Williams
He said he was not surprised the deputy was leading the coup against him.
"He has undermined me all the way ... and I've told him he will have to take the fallout for this. I am getting calls of support, and I think he can expect a public protest at that meeting on Monday fortnight."
Challenger had Forest and Bird affiliations, and given the feeling of many people on the Coast about the environmental lobby he should have declared that when he stood for the council, Birchfield said.
Challenger told the Greymouth Star he was not a member of Forest and Bird when he first stood for election.
"I noticed a lot of people were against them (Forest and Bird) and I joined up to find out what it was all about. But because of the difficulty Allan (Birchfield) had with them I gave up my membership."
Forest and Bird had "noble" aims but was controlled by people from Wellington and Auckland, Challenger said.
"I believe we need more West Coast voices on Forest and Bird to make our views heard. If you take the wetland issue, we have a large number but up there they've destroyed all their wetlands to make money ... now they want to preserve ours and if that's the case they should pay, or agree to land swaps."
He was not worried by the prospect of public protest at the 31 May meeting.
"We're now looking at a kind of 'Trumpism' but this decision (about the chairman) will be made by councillors, not the public, and we have to do what we believe is right," Challenger said.
The public would have a chance to decide at the next local government elections in October 2022.
"This is an interim measure and I would hope by then we will see support for a more moderate council approach coming through, and less of the old hardline views.
"We're getting old on this council and it's time for some younger people to step up."
Birchfield said losing the chairmanship might be a mixed blessing.
"I've had to hold back and be a bit careful as chair, now I can sit down at the other end of the table and maybe make a bit more noise."
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