Mixing politics and governance

When Tania Tapsell MInstD was elected to the Rotorua Lakes Council in 2013 – becoming the second youngest councillor in New Zealand history – she set herself a personal goal of only serving three terms.

In 2022, she was elected Mayor of Rotorua, the first Māori woman to take on that mantle. “I had served those three terms so I was either going up or out,” says Tapsell. “Fortunately, the community supported me to go up.

“When I first became a councillor I was 21 and there were people who had been councillors longer than I had been alive. You see that a lot on councils and boards, and while experience is important, there needs to be a debate about fixed terms and succession plans.”

The council Tapsell is leading is, however, full of fresh faces. Out of 10 members, seven are serving their first term. She says she has loved working with members, through a year that has been challenging professionally and eventful personally. In early June, she and partner Kanin Clancy welcomed daughter Kahumoa, making Tapsell only the second mayor in New Zealand history to give birth while in office.

The challenges included addressing the council’s $5.6 million deficit and the highly publicised situation of many people living in emergency housing and motels in the city.

“We manage $1.7 billion in public assets,” she says, giving an idea of the scale of the council. “There was also a lot of work to do to restore Rotorua and work to do with the council. We came out with a tough annual plan to stop unnecessary spending while investing in critical infrastructure as a priority.

“We are now in surplus and by going hard on issues that were not working well we have been able to reduce the amount of households in emergency housing motels by half. We are driving a strong focus on making practical and measurable differences in people’s lives. It’s all very well to have policies and strategies but you also need an effective action plan on how you can implement them.” 

Tapsell says an important part of achieving those goals, and current and future ones, was creating an effective culture among councillors. “A very strong focus for me, from the start, has been that even if councillors have different views I will respect those. But if they start tackling each other and not the issues, I put a firm stop to that. We have changed the culture around the table – there is a focus on the right things. We have also led a lot of change internally to important decision-making processes and have improved transparency by opening more meetings and workshops to the public.”

Tapsell also served six years on the New Zealand Community Board Executive, which represents 110 community boards, becoming deputy chair, and her Rotorua Lakes roles include chairing the council’s Operations and Monitoring Committee.

She cites strong effective governance as being critical to creating a strong effective culture and achieving the best outcomes for the community. “Particularly at a time when local government and politics is being questioned by the community, good governance is really important to give the community confidence and to remind people that, at a time of centralising, there is still great value and impact in local decision-making.

“There are a lot of similarities between boards and councils, but for councillors there is very high public scrutiny. Everything we do and say is up for challenge. However, that is a great way to hold us accountable. Rather than looking at it as a challenge, my mind set is it is an opportunity, to share how important council and local decision-making is.

“One of the key things I believe will result in good governance practice is knowing how and what you need to do, and not being afraid of change. When you are managing a budget and a cost of living crisis while maintaining access to services, the only way to be successful is to stay focused on what is important to you and to the people you serve. That and sticking to your values – that will always help in times of uncertainty.”

Born and raised in Rotorua, Tapsell joined the city’s youth council at the age of 14 and in 2010 was selected by Rotorua MP Todd McClay to represent the electorate at the New Zealand Youth Parliament.

“They give the next generation a taste of leadership and the highs and lows, and the realities of what it would be like being in parliament or council. Even at that early stage, those experiences taught me important lessons about decision-making processes and about needing to prioritise your time and your community.

“When you are discussing national issues it is easy to get caught up in that, but you don’t want to forget about the people who put you there in the first place. It was an important learning, that a strong local voice is needed to do a good job at a national level.”

Tapsell gained diplomas in business and marketing, and a Bachelor of Management Studies from the University of Waikato. She has worked in tourism and for BNZ Business Partners and Deloitte as a consultant growing businesses.

When she first decided to run for council, she says she felt it was very much “a long shot” but she was driven by the interest sparked by her youth council experiences and her desire to see more diversity in council.

“The Rotorua community does have a history of supporting a diverse council, but I remember as a teenager looking around at the decision-makers and thinking I did not see much representation of Māori or of women, and that we needed to make this more of a place for everyone.”

The youth council planted the seed of what would ultimately become a career on council and a successful first year as mayor. “I was passionate about wanting to make a difference, but I remember speaking to my family and not feeling confident about whether the community would support me.

“I didn’t see my diversity – young, female and Māori – as an advantage to being elected. But my family convinced me those were all the reasons why I needed to be at the table. I overcame doubt – from myself or from others – about whether I was competent by working so hard no-one could question that I was deserving of such an important role.”

Not only was she the first wahine Māori mayor of Rotorua, she was only the second Māori mayor in the city’s history, following in the footsteps of Harry Dansey (1941-42). “It had been a while,” she laughs. “What was particularly moving was my iwi of Te Arawa welcomed me onto my marae with a special pōwhiri to acknowledge the significance.

“My hapū, Ngāti Whakaue, gifted much of the land that was used to create the original Rotorua township, including the land our beautiful museum, hospital, and some of education facilities are on. For my hapū to have gifted the land and for me to now be leading the city as mayor is very special.”

While still serving as a councillor and throughout her mayoral campaign and early days as mayor, Tapsell was also participating in the IoD’s Mentoring for Diversity programme.

Her mentor was highly experienced director Tania Te Rangingangana Simpson CFInstD, a passionate advocate for Māori leaders whose many governance roles include being the first Māori director of the Reserve Bank of New Zealand.

“The programme came at the perfect time for me,” she says. “I started when I was a councillor and having the mentorship of someone as inspiring and grounded as Tania was extremely beneficial to ensuring I hit the ground running.

“One of the key lessons I learned from her was to be unapologetic of who you are and what you are doing. While I was settling into my new role as mayor, I really valued being able to have that mentor relationship. Even though I had achieved the pinnacle of my local government goals, the learning never stops.

“Tania was also very strong on not just focusing on the business side of things but also on the realities of managing personal life and governance roles.” That is particularly relevant, given Tapsell is now balancing motherhood with a 24/7 mayoral role.

“I’m absolutely loving having, for me, the two most important jobs – being a mum at the same time as being a mayor. I often think about the suffragettes, women who fought for the right to even vote. I would love nothing more than to have had a conversation with them, to let them know it was all worth it.”