Not only do they set the rules, they are the referee as well.

In central governments, the average worker is a nobody. Managers might have influence in their own departments, but not in others. In local government, people are more interconnected. This makes the problem worse. You could appeal to your elected representatives, but they are more likely to know the key people, work with them regularly, and need them in the future. You will be sacrificed for the ongoing relationship.

It is a world-wide issue. Here is a typical example from New Zealand, that has all the hallmarks of a classic battle with incompetence, cover-ups, outright lies and legal bullying funded by the deep pockets of unsuspecting taxpayers. “David” is Murray and Margaret Shaw, while “Goliath” is the Hamilton City Council.

The Shaws are retired, and have devoted a couple of decades to creating a beautiful nature sanctuary on the outskirts of the city. There are ponds, trees and an abundance of native birds, safe from the city where pet cats often kill chicks, and street lights dazzle the owls at night.

The council has spent the same couple of decades planning suburban growth to devour the surrounding land. Thousands of pages of reports and studies gathered dust on shelves as the wheels of bureaucracy turned slowly. But a sudden offer in 2017 of $280m in government funding changed that. The politicians needed target dates for each stage (unsurprisingly connected to election timetables), so City Hall was under time pressure to deliver.

Despite the narrative of carefully planned operations, this is how governments really operate – long periods of stagnation followed by frantic and chaotic lurches as political momentum shifts. It is no surprise that shortcuts get taken.

Out came the old reports. A scoping document showed a few red lines linking up theoretical future shopping zones, drawn by an office junior who had never visited the site. A decision was quickly made, and it became the masterplan for the road layout.

Nobody noticed the large gully and swamp in the way.

Haste meant the process was completely backwards. Forced acquisition of the land began immediately, but three years later, when engineers realised a 200m long viaduct was needed, official information stated: “Engineering reports based on the geotechnical (ground) testing are anticipated to be completed towards the end of the design phase”. This is truly astonishing – geotechnical testing should be the starting point. It didn’t start until 2022.

A mere 600 metres of empty farmland away, the ground was flat and easy with solid foundations.

New Road layout finalised in 2017, five years before any ground testing for foundations was carried out.

New Zealand law requires public consultation for major projects like this. It is a long and tedious process of feedback, interviews, public hearings and potential legal challenges. The council sidestepped all of that by going back to documents from 2007. Murray and Margaret had written a letter in support of the new road, so council managers decided this was all the consultation they needed.

There were two major problems with this. Firstly, the 2007 document was for a different site, part of ‘Variation 14’ for the new suburb’s Stage One, and the council’s own District Plan at the time stated: “The remainder of the [suburb] does not have a staged infrastructure development plan”. In other words, there were no roads that the Shaws were consulted on.

The second problem is even more serious. The Shaws never wrote the letter. The council has not been able to produce an original, only versions that appear to have a photocopied signature. The text is technical planning jargon, which the Shaws don’t even understand, and is mostly cut and pasted from other council files. This exposes a history of short cuts, as the letter was used to get Stage One approved.

The new masterplan was soon ready to be presented to the wider community for their adulation. Money was splashed on events and engagements. Glossy brochures were printed and web pages updated. Positive support was garnered from people who lived on the other side of the city, and the numbers were topped up by council employees who were told to put their names down. The PR gurus did their job well.

Murray and Margaret were rather surprised to discover the road through their property, and even more shocked when they were told they had already approved it.

There was also the offer of cash to neighbouring landowners affected by the new roads. The law allows for government departments to offer fair value as compensation, and most of them didn’t want to stand in the way of progress. This changed later on, when the compensation packages were announced.

The council eventually registered that the cost of building a road across a swamp was going to have an impact. The money left over for the ‘fair value’ of the land was nearly zero. The Shaw’s neighbours were very upset. Faced with mounting opposition, the council raided other budgets and a series of confidential settlements were reached in a classic divide-and-conquer maneuver. The Shaws were left on their own, or so the council thought.

After beating their heads against a bureaucratic brick wall, and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on lawyers, Murray and Margaret realised they needed to change the game. They opened their land to the public as a park. Thousands thronged to it, enjoying picnics and strolling through the bush walkways. They flagged every tree that the council planned to cut down and people could sign up to protect individual trees. The roadway became a camp ground so visitors from across the country could stay there. A petition of 55,000 signatures was delivered to the council, equal to one third of the city’s population.

City Hall did not take kindly to the opposition. They doubled down with their own media campaign, including pamphlets and a website criticising the Shaws. An independent review of the criticism debunked every one of the 14 points, yet the council continued with it. They enlisted help from other government organisations. Tellingly, the head of the regional council publicly refused, but the Department of Conservation obliged – bizarrely threatening to euthanise the Shaws’ rescued birds. Murray always had a special affinity with birds, and friends bought him injured native species. He was able to nurse many back to health, yet now the government wanted to kill them ‘in order to protect them’.

It was getting nasty, so the Shaws stepped it up too. Some research into the land’s history turned up significant Maori connections. There is now a tribal protest site because the road will destroy archaeological areas. Diggers and bulldozers that Murray used to make the ponds were now used to block off gates, preventing council staff from access. Police were called, but when supporters showed up with video cameras, the boys in blue backed down.

Five years in, and the council is way behind on its deadlines. The Mayor who started it all is long gone. The council chief executive (the real power behind the throne) who rushed ahead with decisions has resigned into obscurity. But replacements are stuck in a system that is already over-committed. Throughout, the Shaws have suffered terrible stress.

Had the council taken the obvious solution of relocating the road, it could have done so by now, saving millions on construction, yet battle lines are still drawn.

There is an unlikely saviour, if politicians have the vision to see it. The coming global recession will slow the city’s growth. Further infrastructure spending will need to be delayed. The council is being handed a second opportunity to relocate the road. There will be time to change the land acquisition and redesign it, preferably after proper geotechnical investigations are carried out, without any political cost.

Maybe City Hall can settle for a draw.

By Andrew Bydder

Photo of Murray and Margaret Shaw: © Benjamin Wilson Photography.