Democracy Action and the Auckland Ratepayers’ Alliance are hitting back against David Taipari, the Chair of Auckland’s
"Independent Māori Statutory Board", who has labelled the groups’ co-published report on the extraordinary spending and duplication of Auckland Council’s spending targeted specifically for the benefit of
Maori as “racist and inaccurate”.
Jo Holmes, a spokesperson for the Ratepayers’ Alliance, said:
“Questioning duplication of services and the massive increases in spending of ratepayer money is not ‘racism’, it’s
common sense. For David to take a cheap shot and label that ‘racist’ - is a pathetic attempt to try and shut down debate
on how much ratepayer money is involved.”
“We stand by the figures in our report – they are all sourced from the Council’s own information”
“The only thing Mr Taipari pointed to justify the massive increases in targeted spending on Maori is that he wants even
more. This is classic gravy train stuff, and we are glad to be exposing it.”