Former Gore mayor Tracy Hicks has denied chief executive Stephen Parry is a bully amid growing calls from the public for him to resign.
It comes after current mayor Ben Bell told Sunday of the toll his fractured relationship with his councillors is having on his mental health.
Bell became New Zealand’s youngest mayor when he was elected in October, at the age of 23. However, his term since entering office has been met with discord and controversy.
On Thursday the council announced that the majority of elected representatives had asked for the mayor to resign, saying they had lost confidence in him and that they believed he didn’t have the best interests of the community at heart.
The 24-year-old has refused to resign and said he’s "committed to undertaking the role I was elected to do".
It comes after months of division at the council, and an extraordinary meeting in which Bell became so overwhelmed, he had to walk out.
In a statement, Local Government Minister Kieran McAnulty told Breakfast, "Councils are responsible for resolving their own problems".
"This is the expectation for all councils in New Zealand. At the moment, statutory obligations are being met. If that changes, then intervention will be considered."
Former Gore mayor Tracy Hicks, who was ousted from the top spot at last year’s local government election after losing to Bell by a slim margin, called the situation unfolding in the Southland town “really unfortunate”.
"This is a community that’s known stability – particularly in local government – for a long, long time and just to see from the outside what’s going on at the moment is not a good thing," he said.
"Obviously, there’s a breakdown between the relationships, particularly between the mayor and the chief executive, but it’s not a good look and I’m disappointed it’s got to this point."
Hicks said being a former mayor, he "normally wouldn’t comment on this sort of thing at all" but decided to speak out over the growing division within the community.
"I’ve never seen this community as divided as it is right this minute and I’m pretty keen to do whatever I can – whatever that might be – to make sure we get to a good transition to whatever is next."
While McAnulty said there is no need to step in at this stage, Hicks believed there "does need to be some intervention from Government" before the situation worsens further.
"I understand what the minister is saying now, but it won’t be long before they are starting to miss those crucial points, particularly around the annual plan and the long-term plan stuff that’s going on.
"There’s never been a more important time in local government than right this minute, and to make sure that we have a functioning council that’s going to ensure productivity and consistency into the future is absolutely vital."
Hicks denied the fractured relationship between Bell and the majority of the council is due to seasoned councillors not wanting to answer to a much younger mayor.
"I don’t think that’s the case at all, actually. In fact, I think I know all of the councillors sitting around the table who I’ve got the utmost respect for. I don’t agree with them all but they are people that have got a wide breadth of knowledge.
"They walk in all sorts of society in this community and understand what’s going on.
"Absolutely age, I don’t believe, has got something to do with this."
He said while he "absolutely" agreed change needed to be made, “what that is could be a variety of things".
"I think there does need to be interventions from outside. I don’t know that the council can actually work through this one themselves and I’d die in a ditch to protect democracy but I think democracy needs protection from itself right at this present time and having an intervention from central government, I think."
'Going on hearsay can be a dangerous thing'
The independent review will investigate the relationship breakdown between Mayor Ben Bell and the council’s chief executive Stephen Parry. (Source: 1News)
Hicks also denied chief executive Stephen Parry had been a bully through the majority of his tenure.
"Something that some people really struggle with is he’s got the ability to make hard calls when they need to be made and sometimes, that doesn’t go down well but when there’s a good number of people and there’s 100-plus people employed in the local district then there’s always going to be some disaffected, unfortunately," he said.
However, sources told Sunday a number of former council staff had raised concerns with Hicks around bullying allegations about Parry, which they said Hicks had failed to act on.
Hicks said "that's not correct".
"I can only recall one person coming to me – an employee and her husband – and I took that at face value and then I saw the other side, I perhaps changed my view.”
Sunday spoke to multiple sources, including former chief financial officer Doug Walker, who left the council in 2007 after he said he was "terrorised" by Parry. He claimed Parry made false allegations about him, and requested that the IT manager search his emails.
He moved to the UK, he said, to escape the ordeal, but Parry tracked him down in 2008 and visited him at home during an overseas trip.
"He got a bit abusive and stuff… he took photos and all sorts, it was just horrible, absolutely horrible," he said.
Hicks called the incident "not one of Steve’s best moments, I would have to say".
"I’m not sure what that was all about. I know that he was in the UK on business at the time but that wasn’t good."
He said while there have been claims Parry was abusive, "I could come up with multiples of individuals who would say the opposite".
"This is a ‘he said, she said’ situation and as I said before, really unfortunate for this community which is a really strong and coherent community and doing some really good stuff."
While around 2500 people have since signed an online petition calling for Parry to resign, Hicks said he believes he should continue in his role.
"I wouldn’t blame him if he did. Talk about having the fire of public opinion but personally, I don’t think he should.
"I think that if there’s some sort of investigation, intervention that would indicate that something’s gone wrong, then maybe he should but there is quite a bit of uninformed comment going on.
"Going on hearsay can be a dangerous thing."
Greens, ACT weigh in
Later on Breakfast, Green MP Chlöe Swarbrick and ACT deputy leader Brooke van Velden weighed in on the saga.
Swarbrick pointed out that "a vote of no confidence doesn't actually have any meaningful practical implication".
"Unless you're talking about continuing to try and erode the mandate and cause more chaos," she added. "Kia kaha, Ben, and stick it out there".
"There are far, far more important things that the council could be focusing on."
Van Velden said: "We need to encourage more people to be engaged in politics and to put themselves forward to represent the people.
"What I want to see is the councillors and people in council actually respect the fact that the people had their right to a vote, and they voted in Ben Bell, and they should let him do his job."
Both agreed that the Government should not intervene, however.
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