Environment Canterbury says comments made by Canterbury's mayors in a letter to Local Government Minister Rodney Hide are specious.

The mayors and their chief executives did not share the letter or their concerns with Environment Canterbury. "The mayors have behaved in an outrageous, discourteous and back-door fashion," says Environment Canterbury chairman Sir Kerry Burke.

"We operate with a no-surprises agreement across all the councils, and in particular with Christchurch City, to ensure we are all aware of any shared concerns and actively collaborating with good communication leading to resolutions, not getting distracted with back-room bickering.

"But in this case, not one mayor has written to Environment Canterbury expressing any complaints like those outlined in the Timaru Herald article today. They simply went to the Minister."

According to the Herald, Timaru mayor Janie Annear has alleged the regional council has failed to show leadership through the Canterbury Water Management Strategy and the Regional Land Transport Strategy.

"Both these projects have been led by senior Environment Canterbury staff and councillors in the past year or more," said Sir Kerry." The collaboratively-designed water strategy has won applause from central Government and both farming and environmental sectors - a first for New Zealand in many areas. Environment Canterbury has worked hard to ensure that it has been owned by all parties and not managed from a top-down approach. That is not "failing to show leadership" as alleged."

On the transport front, regional council deputy chair and Regional Transport Committee chairwoman Cr Jo Kane said that Canterbury led the successful setting up and transition to the new Regional Transport Committee structure. "This bedded the new committee down and provided the leadership and technical expertise to see it through a number of tough challenges," she said.

"The regional land transport strategy, like the water strategy, is similarly collaborative, with Canterbury members working together and Environment Canterbury taking a lead role to ensure the region would not be disadvantaged. As a result, we are the only region that had a regionally prioritised and 100% agreed list of transport projects before legislation made it mandatory to do so. This positioned us well for when the change occurred.

"On two occasions, when legislation changed and when significant funding announcements affecting Canterbury were made, Environment Canterbury took the lead and initiated meetings with the whole region (including mayors) and central Government representatives so we could better understand the issues and form a Canterbury view on what they meant for us. This has lead to informed and measured discussions with central Government politicians as well as the Minister of Transport.

"Significant gains were made for the region in the funding round with the whole region benefiting by having a rigorous land transport plan. This "Canterbury approach" to dealing with challenging issues around transport is well regarded in Wellington," said Cr Kane.

"Our own surveys of ratepayers show 69% agree that Environment Canterbury is providing good value for rates money," said Sir Kerry. "This figure has not changed much at all in recent years, which indicates that Environment Canterbury is meeting the needs of most of our ratepayers.

"It is important to reiterate that Canterbury ratepayers are part of a democracy and it is the community which decides how it wants to be governed, not the politically-motivated mayors.

"Canterbury has consistently had the highest growth rates in the country which defies the mayors' claim that the regional council is a block on growth.

"This latest approach direct to the Minister shows how hard it is for some groups to embrace a collaborative style of governance which Environment Canterbury has pioneered in recent years across governance and across resource management issues.

"Without this more inclusive approach, the Canterbury Water Management Strategy would not have achieved the traction it has and it is disappointing to see this side-show erupt and take the gloss off what has been an excellent model of collaborative planning and community involvement.

"We welcome any review by the minister as we are confident that our management systems and engagement with our communities is above reproach," said Sir Kerry.