The Country 15/07/26: Jim Hopkins talks to Jamie Mackay

An old hand in local body politics comments on what can be done about escalating rural rates. Plus, he has a wonderful ’60s tale to tell about his pirate radio connection with the late great Sir Sam Neill.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's great to catch up with old mates on the country.

(00:01):
Here's one of them, Jim Hopkins. Jim, we're going to
talk about rates, especially for rural New Zealand, and I
know that strikes sphere into your heart as a white
Tachi district councilor. Before we do that, I've got like
thirty seconds, and I want to pay not me, I
want you to pay a tribute to Sam Neil, the
late Sir Sam Neil, because you go way back to

(00:23):
the sixties gym. I don't know whether you inhaled or not,
but tell me your story.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
No comic, Well this is all before Sam was Steamers.
So my tribute is to a guy with an absolutely
fabulous voice. He was. He is so creamy and smooth
and anyway hugely appropriate for what we were trying to do,

(00:48):
because what we wanted. You may remember the pirate radio
ship try that started broadcasting radio how Rakis programs near Auckland. Well,
we decided that, of course we were all at Union
at the time, writing student reviews and so on. We
decided we'd have a pirate radio station and crowch church
during camping wheat and we teed up in yachts or

(01:10):
a fishing boat of can't remember which, but we did
have a skipper who was willing to help manage to
scrounge a tape recorder and got supply a whole stack
of to real tapes. And along came Jeremy Smith and
he bought a friend of hers lo and behold Sam Neil,
who was the best DJ of the lot. And we
were originally going to go out on the boat and

(01:32):
broadcast from the you know at sea, but went out
that there wasn't enough rooms, so we had to record
all the shows at my place or Mom and Dair's
place in Manchester Street, and we all took turns recording
our pirate radio rearshifts, building up a goodly number of shows.

(01:54):
And then sadly, at the eleventh hour the skipper's lawyer,
who was the skipper who was going to take tapes
out to see him play. The skipper's lawyer persuaded him
it was far too big of a risky could based prosecution.
He pulled the pen and the whole venture sank without
a trace. We all went our separate ways. Sam went

(02:14):
up to Wellington to work for the National Film Unit
as a director, and therein lies the tale of the
pirate radio station starring Sam Neil that never happened.

Speaker 1 (02:27):
What a great story. Hey, Jim, I'm going to run
thisself out of time here. You're an old hand not
only in the media but also in local body politics.
You've been involved for the second half of your life
basically in local body politics. You're now with the Waitaki
District Council. You are in financial trouble. I note at
one stage of forty or fifty percent rate rise was mooted.

(02:49):
I think you've settled at seventeen percent.

Speaker 2 (02:52):
But this is just sixteen point nine.

Speaker 1 (02:55):
All right, it's not an election year. But this is
a typical isn't it, or typical of what's happening right
around the country. And I want to ask you this question.
Will amalgamation, as Shane Jones wants, solve the woes of
local body authorities.

Speaker 2 (03:12):
Probably not. It will solve some of the problems. It
will make them administration easier. And certainly the government is
saying that these new unitary authorities have to be able
to implement the two new Planning Acts, which are much
more permissive and enabling and growth focused than the previous RIMA.

(03:35):
And those two acts themselves will actually make a substantial
difference and perhaps improve things. And certainly with a smaller
number of councilors that will be an easier they will
be easier to administer. Basically, the lesson of amalgamations worldwide
is you save a lot of money initially with the

(03:57):
administration because let's say you merge five councils and you
actually turn five kind of management layers into one. So
there's savings there, but that's more or less it, and
the government is going to find that the problem that

(04:18):
they refuse to acknowledge, which is that they've got far
through much of the money and councils have far through
little of the money. Councils managed thirty percent of New
Zealand's infrastructure, but they've only got about ten percent of
the money that's compulsorily collected, and Parliament or government generally

(04:39):
speaking doesn't share the eight five percent plus that it
gathers through taxations and other charges. And yes, the roading
thing is jointly funded. But in the end the issue

(05:00):
is as long as councils are required to do all
the things they are being required to do at the moment,
then there will not be using the current funding systems,
there will not be enough money to pay for them all.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
Hey Jim, look amount of time. I'm going to come
back with you in the next week or so and
revisit this topic because I also want to ask you
about interesting things that are happening in the Whiteitaki electorate
when it comes to the general election coming up on
November seventh. So nice to chat to you again on
the country and I love you Sam Neil's story. Thanks
for your time.

Speaker 2 (05:37):
Thanks Ray, thank you here