Scoop's Selwyn Manning and Radio Adelaide's Peter Godfrey discuss how a leader from south Auckland, Manukau's mayor Len Brown, has announced he's running for the Auckland super city mayoralty. The other contender is Auckland's incumbent mayor John Banks – two markedly different personalities. The former, a unifying community-led politician, the latter a Rudi Giuliani-styled shoot from the hip kind-of-bloke.

Also, New Zealand's economic recession looks to be almost over with Auckland City and the surrounding region driving growth in the economy. It's a housing and consumer confidence-led recovery rather than the National-led Government's export-led strategy that is doing the business.