PAK’nSAVE Wairau Environment Court Hearing Begins

NEWS RELEASE
3rd October 2008

PAK’nSAVE Wairau - Environment Court Hearing Begins

Foodstuffs (Auckland) Limited’s commitment to open a PAK’nSAVE store on Wairau Road on Auckland’s North Shore continues on Monday when it meets its competitor, Progressive Enterprises Limited, in the Environment Court.

“It’s now a matter of presenting our expert evidence to the Court and working through the Court process. We are working as hard as we can to give the community what it wants and open PAK’nSAVE Wairau,” said Tony Carter, Foodstuffs Managing Director.

Australian-owned Progressive Enterprises Limited is the sole opponent in the Environment Court hearing, which starts on Monday 6 October 2008. Progressive Enterprises has appealed the decision of the North Shore City Council to grant consent for the PAK’nSAVE on Wairau Road. The case is set down for four weeks.

Foodstuffs applied for a fully notified consent in June 2007, and more than 1000 people registered their support for the store. The combined North Shore City Council and Auckland Regional Council consent hearing was held in November 2007 and resource consent to open the PAK’nSAVE was granted in January 2008. Progressive Enterprises then appealed the decision of the North Shore City Council to the Environment Court, preventing the store from opening.

Foodstuffs has been wanting to open a PAK’nSAVE on the Wairau Road site for 17 years, and received resource consent to build the supermarket in October 2004. Work commenced and the store was due to open in August 2005, creating 300 jobs in the area.

Progressive opposed the North Shore City Council’s granting of the consent on a non-notified basis, and the consent was overturned by the High Court in June 2005, forcing work on the supermarket to stop.

Mr Carter says “The ongoing support we have received from people on the North Shore has been outstanding. We are committed to bringing PAK’nSAVE’s policy of New Zealand’s lowest food prices to Wairau Road.”

ENDS

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