David Hay for Mayor of Auckland

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24 February 2015

Mayoral candidate urges council to stay the course

Mayoral candidate David Hay has today urged councillors to “stay the course” and support the proposed out-of-scope changes to the Unitary Plan made in December last year.

“The Council has made some errors in the process, and it will need to do some serious work to recover from the position it has put itself in.” said Mr Hay. “But it also needs to back itself. If Council is confident that it has made the right decisions with the out-of-scope proposals to change the Unitary Plan, then councillors need to display that confidence today.”

“Auckland Council has made a rod for its own back by holding most of the Unitary Plan Committee meetings in secret, throughout last year. Aucklanders don’t know what advice was given to the Committee, they haven’t seen the decision-making process unfold, and they don’t really understand the thinking behind these latest proposals.” said Mr Hay.

“The Council therefore should not be surprised that the out-of-scope proposals have met with stiff opposition. It will now have to defend itself in the court of public opinion and possibly the Environment Court, later in the process, because its lack of transparency and poor communication have undermined public confidence in the integrity of its decision-making.”

“However if the Council is confident in the decisions made by the Unitary Plan Committee, then it must back those decisions. It has to stay the course.”

“I think the Council will also have to work very hard to restore public confidence in its decision-making among those most affected by the out-of-scope proposals. It should start by publishing the full agendas and minutes of the Unitary Plan Committee meetings from which the public and media were excluded.”

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