Albany ward councillor John Watson. Photo / Nick Reed
The right to free speech has been drilled into politicians on Auckland Council after a bitter rift over controversial plans for regional parks and the Hauraki Gulf.
It comes after University of Auckland law professor Ron Paterson dismissed claims in a code of conduct complaint brought by two members of the City Vision bloc against Albany councillor John Watson.
Waitematā and Gulf councillor Pippa Coom and Waiheke Local Board chairwoman Cath Handley made the formal complaint in response to a Facebook post by Watson in March, alleging he "knowingly posted misinformation".
In a complaint to council chief executive Jim Stabback in April 4, the pair said Watson's actions had enabled baseless attacks on members of the Hauraki Gulf Forum and claimed his actions were a material breach of the Code of Conduct.
Watson's post was about "a controversial decision" by the Hauraki Gulf Forum with significant repercussions for the gulf and regional parks without any attempt to consult the public.
The post included an advertisement in the Herald stating members of the Hauraki Gulf Forum voted for "radical change to the governance of the Hauraki Marine Park" and 15,000 people had signed a petition to the proposal for a new 50:50 co-governance authority to manage the marine park.
As members of the forum, Coom and Handley voted for proposed changes and Watson voted against them.
Paterson, who investigated the complaint for the council, found in favour of Watson, saying comments in his post of "radical change" and "significant repercussions for both Gulf and Regional Parks" were clearly within the bounds of robust political debate.
Full page ad in yesterday’s Herald identifying which way elected representatives voted on the Hauraki Gulf Forum’s...
Posted by John Watson on Wednesday, March 16, 2022
He said the council code of conduct states "elected members can express a personal view to the media at any time' and this is consistent with the right to freedom of expression in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act.
"I see no evidence that Councillor Watson has crossed a line and made derogatory or abusive social media comments…elected members are free to publicly name and criticise colleagues for the way they have voted on a contentious issue.
"The code of conduct should not be used to silence members who express strongly held opinions on matters of public interest and criticise political opponents in the media.
"Such reactions are a fact of life in a liberal democracy in the age of social media," said Paterson.
He did, however, pull up Watson on the principle of respect in the code of conduct, saying Coom and Handley regarded his Facebook post as disrespectful, allowed negative comments to be directed at forum members and mischaracterised the forum's advocacy position.
In an email to Watson after his Facebook post, Coom and Nicola MacDonald, who are the co-chairs of the Hauraki Gulf Forum, accused him of promoting misinformation and requested he remove the Facebook post, issue a retraction and apologise to forum members.
Coom told the Herald she respected Paterson's decisions and believed forum members should have their individual opinions, but felt Watson's Facebook post encouraged more misinformation and attacks on forum members, which is made up of politicians, government officials and tangata whenua.
She said the forum has a governance statement and agreed principles, like respecting each other's views, but Watson has a different style of conducting himself.
"I felt for the forum members, who often don't have a voice on this issue and have had to deal with a whole lot of abuse and racism and very nasty attacks because of the way the co-governance story was reported," Coom said.
Handley did not want to comment on the code of conduct complaint, other than saying it was not an attempt to curb free speech.
In a statement to Peterson responding to the complaints, Watson said he regarded the actions of Coom and Handley "as vexatious and an attempt to intimidate and harass an elected member of Auckland Council into abandoning his duty.
"This is an attempt to stifle free speech and open public debate on a controversial issue.
"As an elected representative of Aucklanders I will not be intimidated into silence on a matter of public interest … my legal advice tells me they have no powers to enforce the aggressive demands in that email," he said.
The issue highlights a long-running rift between the so-called "A" team aligned to mayor Phil Goff who control the council and the "B" team of councillors on the outer.
Watson is one of the most outspoken members of the "B" team, saying being threatened with code of conducts are never far from the surface for those singled out as the opposition.
"I was forced to seek legal advice in an attempt to stop the abuse of this process which I regard as a form of harassment," he said.
The Hauraki Gulf and regional park issue has also upset former Auckland councillor Mike Lee so much he is considering standing for re-election at October's local body elections.
Writing in the Ponsonby News this week, Lee said Auckland's 28 regional parks have long been considered the city's "jewels in the crown" and accused the council of floating the idea of breaking up the parks network.
He said when word got out to transfer 20 or 21 coastal regional parks into the Department of Conservation Hauraki Gulf Marine Park, 4684 public submissions were lodged against the proposal.
'They just treat me like "one of the guys" but still realise I have different strengths.'