New research has shown that South Australian residents value local government for wide-ranging roles and services.
The report ‘Why Local Government Matters in South Australia’ was released by the Centre for Local Government at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS:CLG) and funded by the Research and Development Scheme of the Local Government Association of South Australia and the Australian Centre of Excellence for Local Government.
Findings are based on a survey of 1002 South Australians, four focus groups and data from the national ‘Why Local Government Matters’ online survey, the South Australian project reinforces the findings from the 2014/2015 national research project by UTS:CLG.
The majority of respondents rated local government’s role in planning for the future (81 per cent), developing local economies (71 per cent) and promoting local health and wellbeing (69 per cent) as extremely or very important.
The majority of South Australians support collaboration in government service delivery (73 per cent), and almost 60 per cent of respondents strongly or moderately agree that governments should use a mixture of public, private and not-for-profit organisations to deliver public services.
The research comes in a political climate in which local government amalgamations are being considered by the State government, which has been met with expected push back from the local government sector.
Director of UTS:CLG and project leader Associate Professor Roberta Ryan said the research reinforces the importance of local governments’ role as an advocate for local communities.
“Following our national research ‘Why Local Government Matters’ over the past three years, the new report provides a detailed snapshot of how South Australians perceive local government and its role in society,” Prof Ryan said.
“The findings demonstrate that local government is increasingly being recognised by communities for its important role in advocating for community needs, planning for the future and economic development.”
Local Government Association of South Australia (LGA) President Mayor Dave Burgess said the LGA places a high value on sound independent research and looks forward to working through the findings of the report with South Australian councils.
“The ability to undertake research into local attitudes, but also compare and contrast the findings with the rest of the country is particularly useful,” Mayor Burgess said.
