Declaration of Interdependence by a Community


The following is a Declaration of Interdependence that could be made by every community of, say between 5000 and 25,000 people. Since there are over 4 million people in New Zealand, it could be made by hundreds of different communities.

We as a community believe we have rights and responsibilities.

We find ourselves tired of growing inequality where the wealth of 62 individuals is now equal to the wealth of the bottom half of the the planet’s population. We are frustrated by the growing power of the corporates and the super wealthy. We are alarmed by decades of inaction on climate change because economics is fundamentally odds with the climate. We grieve for our steadily growing loss of sovereignty with so-called Free Trade Agreements like TPP ceding power to the corporates.

Recognising the power of nature to bat last and the social dangers posed by economic collapse or major climate events, we wholeheartedly believe it is time our economic system was at peace with the planet.

We, the people of …………, now desire to share the values of the land and gifts of Nature and of our inheritance with our whole community, for that is all we have within our power.

Given the power of the corporates to influence governments and therefore the relative futility of national action to bring our economic system in line with nature, we recognise that this fundamental change can only happen at the local level.


We therefore agree among us to:
• Gradually own all our own land collectively so that no one will profit or lose from owning land. We will gradually bring more and more land into a Community Land Trust while compensating the owners fairly. We will thus take land out of the marketplace.
• Create a new currency, acceptable for our public revenue. This currency will be designed to circulate smoothly. It will not be created as interest-bearing debt because that creates more debt, but be spent into existence.
• Organise ourselves as a governance unit, electing our own people, making our own rules and being responsible for enforcing them. This includes keeping the value of the new currency stable. The rules will include rules for businesses using the currency and rules for imposing appropriate resource rents from water, minerals or any other part of the commons.
• Gather revenue from land and other resource rents and use it for public purposes including for regular distribution of a dividend for all our citizens resident here for a year or more.
• Collectively budget together at least twice a year.
• Create and maintain a register of citizens eligible for dividends.


We further agree to:
• Co-operate with neighbouring communities to build and maintain such infrastructure as needed by a larger community and perform other governance functions that are better organised and financed on a larger scale.
• Co-operate with district and regional councils as above.
• Co-operate with central government as above.
• Co-operate with district, regional and central government for any revenue sharing in the new currency as we believe mutually beneficial.
• Co-operate with all other communities to keep the value of the new shared currency stable. We envisage a network of inflation control teams based in every community working together for this purpose.


We do not agree that central government will impose their tax laws on trades in our currency or interfere with the formation or operation of our Community Land Trust. We do not agree to any interference from the Reserve Bank of NZ regarding the legitimacy of our new currency or the way we control its stability.





















So what does the policy say now?







We invite alternative solutions
April 2015

Submission to the Local Government Commission on Reorganisation of Wellington Local Government



1 March 2015

1. Who we are

















Why not create a national currency at local level?

upmapOver a period of two years or more we have proposed:

1. A second national currency. The currency to be issued by Treasury, spent into existence to buy land. The new currency will have no other taxes than land rents, natural resource rents and taxes on bads. We aim to move to a tax system that taxes the monopoly use of the commons rather than labour and sales. Some revenue will be distributed as a Citizens Dividend to all citizens who have lived there for a year or more, the rest will be shared by all levels of government. We advocate a Land Rental Index to be set up in each area, with land rents being adjusted annually according to the index. Land rentals are relatively very stable over time. It is only when there is a major event like and earthquake that they decline or when a railway is put in or a labour intensive business arrives that they rise more than just a tiny bit. The new money would be good for the payment of rates and taxes. No further rates would be payable.

2. We have occasionally advocated a Christchurch currency and an Auckland currency created by spending it into existence to buy land. This would require complete cooperation from the central government as legislation would be needed to make it free of income tax, GST and company tax as before. Rents would be shared as a small Citizens Dividend. The rest would be shared with central government. So a similar design but a city currency as well as a national one.

3. Then very recently we went a step further and suggested that Local Boards (the Auckland supercity calls them this and there are 21 Local Boards as shown on graphic) create the currency, spend it into existence to buy land. A monetary authority will have to be set up to ensure there is no inflation. Revenue from land rents and some natural resource rents can be gathered by Local Boards and first distributed to the local citizens then the rest used at local board level and then sent up the line to supercity and to central government. Supercities would have power to impose taxes on water pollution e.g. leaching of nitrates that uses the commons of the aquifers and rivers. (and to tax the use of water for commercial purposes.)

This option 3 would require several currencies to co-exist. The usual NZ dollar, the new NZ dollar, the supercity dollar and the Local Board dollar. We had considerable difficulties and confusion when discussing exchangeability of currencies.


4. Option 4 arrived a couple of days after I spoke to a meeting at a Motueka ecovillage in response to the questions and problems. This one is simpler and is like the formation of a river from the small streams to the river to the sea. Create the new national currency at Local Board level and pass it up the line. Local Boards would set up a Land Committee to decide which land should be bought first. Each local board might decide differently in consultation with its community. Every decision has the right to be vetoed by the local hapu or iwi and where applicable the Maori Land Court should be involved. You would also need a local committee (perhaps the same one) to administer a Land Rental Index or where appropriate because of different desirabilities of sites e.g. Wellington hill suburbs for sun. You would also need a local Monetary Authority to monitor inflation. It would work closely with the Supercity Monetary Authority and the Treasury Monetary Authority to ensure there is no inflation and that no local board would issue too much or too little new money. These are such important entities that they would have to be voted in.

There are so many issues to comment on here, it would be really good to have a general discussion. Then we can perhaps divide up the discussions. Option 4 finally gives real powers to the local economy, which is in line with our policy. The land board may, after consultation with the local community, choose a local business which needs capital, or choose undeveloped land owned by absentee speculators or the local iwi may have very strong preferences.

For instance, if the local committee chose five sections each valued at $200,000 it would create $1m of national currency. If the committee chose to purchase the land of a speculator, that speculator, seeing no future, might sell the lease and thus release the land for genuine use. Many with mortgages will want their mortgage reduced and, because the new currency is legal tender, the bank would have to accept it for paying off a mortgage. Or the committee may be persuaded that a local business needed capital to employ local labour and grow. A community land trust might ask for their land to be bought so they can take land out of the market. This would enable them to sell houses to younger people to join their village, as otherwise the cost would be unaffordable. They could then use the considerable injection of capital to develop their labour intensive businesses and the ones that use local materials.

Then the monetary authority, in conjunction with the monetary authorities of the supercities and the government would make sure the local board did not issue more money than it was allowed, as inflation must be kept strictly under control.images-1There could be problems with certain rogue local boards. Either they issued too much money and wouldn’t cooperate with the monetary authorities elsewhere, or their leadership was questionable. In that case there should be provision in law to instal a Commissioner until the Board’s administration improved.

In models 1-3 we have designed in a circulation incentive in the form of a dated currency. However perhaps in model 4, since all money flows downstream from local to central, there may be no need of this.

My questions are (and you will raise plenty too):

  1. Exchangeability with the national currency NZ dollar? We had it as they are issued at par and redeemed at par and in between the value changes according to the market. Some have argued there should be no exchangeability with the old national currency.
  2. Will the creation of a second national currency at local board level stimulate the local economy?
  3. How does this all line up with the Maori Land Trust boards and Incorporations situation?
  4. How would the public be protected from local board that go rogue and how would the wider public ensure that local boards representatives can deal with this level of responsibility?

Now there is one more thing that comes before any of this. Councils and Government should never sell land. The idea of the government buying up the land in the Green Frame and then selling it off into private hands is unacceptable. They should keep it and auction the leases to the highest bidder, then share that revenue with the public (via a Citizens Dividend) and the central government. This should be entrenched in law somehow.

Meanwhile a private bidder Auckland City Council has been offered $75,000,000 for a council car park. What a dreadful thing that would be if the council sold off this prime city land for cars to park and for a private enterprise to gain, both in car parking, and in capital gain. As they said in a The Nation programme on TV3, they are developing around traffic hubs. Of course. That means the public pays for the transport infrastructure and private land “owners” benefit from rising land values. Not fair, all wrong. Let logic prevail!

Reservations about Crown Leasehold Land. There are many who will have reservations about the government or the local board buying up their land. The alternative we used to have was that the Government pays you for your land, and the title of your property then bears a covenant, an obligation to pay a ground rent from then on, whoever owns the land. While it is more difficult to explain to the public, a covenant of this nature would give much more peace of mind when it comes to secure tenure of the land. “Leasehold title” has such a bad reputation that it is difficult to explain there are no sudden rent rises if the rent is linked to an index and that the tenure is for a lifetime, with rights that your descendants can get the next lease. No matter how much this is explained it may be better to have a covenant.