Waitomo District Council (WDC) has questioned the basis of today’s Ratepayers' Report released by The New Zealand Taxpayers' Union (NZTU).

The report claims WDC is the least efficient council in terms of staffing, which WDC chief executive, Chris Ryan says “simply isn’t true”.

“We’re continuously looking at how we can operate more efficiently and improve value for our ratepayers. To say we’re the least efficient is frustrating, as the report isn’t comparing apples with apples.  We have pointed this out on previous occasions, but they continue to report inflated numbers.”

The report states the WDC group employs 211 full time staff, which combines WDC employee numbers with those of Inframax Construction Limited (ICL).

“The use of the Group combined number, which includes Inframax employees is misleading. The Inframax construction company is a separate legal entity and operates completely separately to the Council and cannot be included in any measure of WDC staff efficiency.

As at 30 June 2020, we employed 71 full time equivalent (FTE) staff. If you take Inframax staff out we sit at 1 staff member for every 60 households which is comparable, if not better than some other rural councils.”

WDC also confirmed that no WDC employees received severance payments for the year ended 30 June 2020 and none had been displaced as a result of COVID-19.