I have it in black and white Auckland council have no policy with regards to trading with undefined or unidentifiable entities.
My long over due LGOIMA was addressed last night the actual response is here EY report response
I have referred to the actual report previously in the post The Ernst and Young report into Len Brown not worth the paper it is written on
The reason I asked about who the report was written by was because the report did not disclose who EY was and as I pointed out the report on its last page provides the definition for EY as being
EY refers to the global organisation and may refer to one or more of the member
firms of Ernst & Young Global Limited, each of which is a separate legal entity. Ernst & Young Global Limited, a UK company limited by guarantee, does not provide services to clients. For more information about our organisation, please visit ey.com.
© 2013 Ernst & Young, New Zealand.
All Rights Reserved.
If you visit the companies register you will note that there are several EY companies
ERNST & YOUNG NOMINEES (20067)Registered NZ Unlimited Company 7-Jul-67
ERNST & YOUNG LIMITED (437730) Incorporated 30-Nov-89
ERNST & YOUNG CORPORATE NOMINEES LIMITED (955165) Incorporated 15-Apr-99
ERNST & YOUNG TRANSACTION ADVISORY SERVICES LIMITED (953248) Incorporated 20-May-99
ERNST & YOUNG GROUP LIMITED (1221939) Incorporated 28-Jun-02
ERNST & YOUNG LAW LIMITED (2494153) Incorporated 20-May-10
Go to the intellectual property office and you will find that the trade mark EY is registered to EYGN Limited which is not even registered in New Zealand but is apparently registered in Nassau in the Bahamas. The general disclaimer with regards to that company can be found here
The person at Auckland Council who dealt with the request could well have assumed who the company was which prepared the and assumed wrong we will follow up requesting evidence .
As a private Investigator myself I find it most disturbing that a report has been issued which has no evidential value at all for the quoted price of $198,751. I have to wonder if that is before or after GST .
The law issue
I requested the legal basis on which this report was commissioned
the response states
The report was commissioned in accordance with s12(2)(a) and 12(2)(b) of the Local
Government Act 2002 (LGA). Additionally, the Chief Executive has broad power
under s42 of the LGA to ensure the effective and efficient management of the
activities of the local authority.
This response totally circumvents the requirements of the code of conduct elected members set out in part 8 and has requirement for an independent panel .
The sections which have been quotes in the response are nothing more than a brush off
12Status and powers
(2) For the purposes of performing its role, a local authority has—
(a) full capacity to carry on or undertake any activity or business, do any act, or enter into any transaction; and
(b) for the purposes of paragraph (a), full rights, powers, and privileges.
and section 42 sets out the general duties of the Chief executive
But when a specific duty is placed on the CEO that takes prescient over any general responsibility in this case the obligations were to the provisions of the code of conduct and an independent panel should have been appointed not an organsiation which had a pecuniary interest in supporting the Mayor .
Item 2 time sheets
In an open transparent and democratic society one would expect a bill for $198,751 to be explained . Private investigators work at $150 per hour this represents over 33 weeks of work , how many people worked on it and WHERE IS THE EVIDENCE .
The report is such that it has no accountability paying 200,000 for which amounts to unsubstantiated opinion is reckless.
Item 3 Engagement agreement dated 26 October 2013
I have to question the terms of any agreement between EY and Council. the previous CEO Doug Mc Kay was a member of the committee for Auckland and met with the members of this elite group behind closed doors without any requirement to report back to council see Download View as HTML
Membership to the committee for Auckland was justified as follows
Membership to this committee is an operational issue and was approved by the Chief
Executive, or his staff, within delegated financial authority. As such, no Governing Body
approval is required, nor is the Chief Executive required to report back to the Governing
Body.
Once we drew the attention of the CEOs placement on this committee to the attention of he world Stephen towns name was removed from the membership of the committee for Auckland .
Doug Mc Kay who was concurrently with being CEO of Auckland council a director of another committee for Auckland member BNZ .
It appears to me that a CEO who does not appear to know what conflict of interest is , spent more time instructing his fellow members of the committee for Auckland than properly consulting with the executive body of council who employed him.
We await with baited breath to see the path the new CEO follows, his removal from the membership of the committee for Auckland is a step in the right direction
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