7 October 2013

Census figures demolish Len Brown's plans for Auckland

“The first tranche of Census population figures released today throw light on just how little value Aucklanders have received from the first three years of the Auckland Council,” says John Palino.

“The Mayor's leading initiatives, including the CRL and Unitary Plan have been predicated on what we now know are unrealistic growth projections. Not only will the thinking and planning behind these initiatives have to be completely reviewed, many Aucklanders will be wondering what they have received from well over $100m of inaccurate planning in the last three years.

“The Census figures so far released show national population growth of around 31,000 people per annum over the past seven years. That's approximately half that seen over the previous five year period.

“Regional figures have not been released, but will likely show around half of growth occurring in Auckland.

“Project that forward, and we can expect closer to half a million people moving into the region in the next 30 years – nowhere near the 1 million or so which the Mayor has used to push through the Unitary Plan and CRL.

“The implication for the Unitary Plan is that the scaremongering around urban sprawl has been exactly that and we can now move to protect our unique suburbs from Brown's infill plans.

“The implication for the CRL is of even greater concern. The Mayor wants to push this project forward despite flat public transport growth and now much lower population figures.

“The data released today will further reduce the benefits of the CRL because there will be fewer people to take the train. That means that we can expect less than 40 cents of transport benefit and well under 90 cents of economic benefit from the CRL for each dollar invested.

“Ratepayers should breathe a sigh of relief that the Government placed a number of conditions before committing to co-fund the CRL. It is now clear that these are not being and will not be met.

“That leaves Mayor Brown putting Aucklanders on the hook for billions of dollars in future payments for negative return and no national support.

“The more troubling question, however, is why the higher growth figures were used by the Council in the first place.

“It now appears that in order to ram through his election promise, the Mayor pressured the Council into trumping up growth figures to make it look like we need the CRL sooner.

“This is a real problem for Auckland. With exploding debt and a $3 billion investment getting worse by the day, three more years of Len Brown looks set to bankrupt a third of New Zealand's population and destroy the communities in which we live.

“I’ll initiate a complete review of the assumptions behind the Unitary Plan and CRL and provide that information back to residents so we can have an informed, public debate on these critical issues.

“The ‘closed door’ approach to Auckland’s future where the views of the public are subordinate to the planning elite will be replaced by an open, evidence-based, community-led discussion under my leadership,” said Palino.

ENDS

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