A community group today challenged the Government over whether the Auckland super city restructure would produce better results than local body changes 20 years ago.

Panmure Community Action Group chairman Howard Sutton said that, before the late 1980s, the east Auckland suburb had an effective borough council.

"In 1989, the government of the day decided to amalgamate all local boroughs," he told a parliamentary select committee.

"Promises were made of a much better world. It has not happened. Why will this one be better?"

Mr Sutton was appearing before the Auckland governance legislation select committee, which began hearing submissions this morning into the Local Government (Auckland Council) Bill.

The committee has received about 2500 submissions, with 800 organisations and individuals indicating they also wanted to be heard in person.

It will sit from 9am to 9pm from today through to Friday for at least the next two weeks.

The bill sets up a structure for a unitary council and a second tier of 20 to 30 local boards for the Auckland region.

Mr Sutton, echoing a concern that others have expressed, said the local boards would need adequate resources and powers to be effective in serving their communities.

In its written submission, the group said community boards were not achieving all they needed because they were under-funded and deprived of genuine decision-making powers by Auckland City Council rules.

The Local Government Centre at AUT University said how powers were allocated between the new mayor and the new councillors would be a key factor in creating a strong regional decision-making body.

LGC director Peter McKinlay compared three overseas examples -- London, Toronto and Ottawa.

He said London, which had a strong-mayor model with checks and balances overseen by an assembly of elected councillors, was widely regarded as successful in producing effective decision-making and high-profile leadership.

The Canadian cities cited were seen as having weak-mayor models, producing what the respective mayoral's offices described as highly parochial politics in Toronto and "dysfunctional" and "circus-like" council meetings in Ottawa.

The LGC's written submission said the London model was effectively rejected by the Royal Commission on the grounds that it would not be consistent with New Zealand political tradition.

Mr McKinlay said it might be sensible to revisit the powers of the new Auckland mayor as a way of getting a regional mandate and decision maker.

Auckland Chamber of Commerce chief executive Michael Barnett said the chamber wanted the 20 Auckland councillors to be elected from 20 wards.

The Government's plan is for 12 of the councillors to come from wards and eight to be elected at large.

Mr Barnett told the committee that the proposal of having second-tier local boards and also providing for wards to elect councillors "creates confusion".

The chamber believed "a fairer and easier-to-understand system" would be to divide greater Auckland into 20 wards.

It also wanted a provision added to the bill to give rural communities voting power in respect of land use applications and decisions.

This would remove the perception in Franklin and Rodney districts that their rural character would be compromised under a single Auckland Council.