Transport key issue, say ex-leaders

By PHILLIP ENGLISH

Former Auckland local body leaders are almost unanimous in their pick of the big issue facing the Auckland region, although they have different names for it.

The big problem is transport. Others call it congestion.

Dame Catherine Tizard, Mayor of Auckland from 1983 to 1990 and then Governor-General, said she picked traffic congestion - and leadership.

"I think one of the fundamental problems we have created for ourselves - and it is not one that the councils have created - is the free import of cheap secondhand cars.

"If you just look at who drives cars these days ... Once upon a time if there were two cars in the family it was an affluent family.

"Now it is absolutely essential that every child, once they get to driving age, gets their own car. I mean it's just ludicrous.

"That ... is one of the major problems that we have created for ourselves, with all the spin-offs of road congestion and pollution."

Colin Kay, Mayor of Auckland between 1980 and 1983 and chairman of the Auckland Regional Council from 1986 to 1992, said the incumbent, John Banks, with whom he had been quite friendly over the years, was too abrasive for Auckland.

Mr Kay, whose big issue was congestion, said the eastern highway was a loser.

"I'd say personally, get on with finishing the motorways, and public transport is a major.

"We've all got into public transport at various times in our tenures but now it's got so bad it certainly needs strong leadership to pull it through and that leadership [means] the right councillors because the mayor has only got one vote."

Transport was also at the top of the list for former National Party Cabinet minister and Mayor of North Shore City George Gair.

"The position is becoming steadily more difficult and the solutions seem to be getting harder and harder.

"Successive decades of local and central government have both tended to opt for the simpler, cheaper course ...

"Our horizons have been too short.

"So often we merely repeat the problem. This is why those in public life should be prepared to be prodded and pushed and motivated.

"Politics being what it is, there are a large number of people in public life who, having got there, don't want to disturb anybody ... That helps to slow the process down to the point where nothing happens."

Mr Gair said there was also a need to fix infrastructural problems in Auckland.

Tim Shadbolt, now Mayor of Invercargill but Mayor of Waitemata and a member of the old Auckland Regional Authority in the 1980s, said the region's growth was always a problem. Auckland's image was another problem.

He said he was hurt when Aucklanders were portrayed as brash, abrasive, insulting and patronising towards other New Zealanders, but that was Mr Banks' style.

"While growth is the key challenge that Auckland has to face, image is also a key issue and I think it is an issue that mayors can have quite an effect on.

"We've all got to chip in," Mr Shadbolt said. "It would be good if that could be done in a positive, good-willed way rather than in an abrasive, competitive, nasty way."

Les Mills, the Mayor of Auckland between 1990 and 1998, is an exception. He believes voter apathy is the big issue.

"I would think the biggest problem is voter apathy and a lack of understanding of a whole range of issues."

Mr Mills said that if Auckland had problems they were minor.

"I personally don't have any problems getting around. I just think the general development in the suburbs is good ... I'm very bullish about Auckland."