Media release 9 March 2012

Auckland Council consultation process a total sham.

$8 million extra spending on Central Rail Loop may be unlawful.

Too much money in the hands of a tiny group of people.

[Statement from David Thornton]

Yesterday the Auckland Council voted to spend a further $8 million on the proposed Central Rail Loop.

The money is to be spent in the current financial year on preparing a business case to the Government as part of an exercise to persuade the Government to pay half of the $3.2 billion cost of the project.

But the Government has said on more than one occasion that it is not satisfied this project is viable, and is consequently refusing to contribute half the funding it would normally contribute to major transport projects.

Despite this clear refusal, the Council has put the Central Rail ‘Loop’ into the 2012/22 Draft Long Term Plan, and is asking for the public’s view on the expenditure planned on the ‘assumption’ that the Government will pay up eventually.

The amount in the Draft Long Term Plan the Council is asking the public to approve for the Loop for next year, 2012/13, is more than $110 million.

The Council is required by law to ‘genuinely consult’ when considering the public’s views before finalising the Long Term Plan in time to set next year’s rates bill.

What Council did yesterday was to ‘transfer’ $8 million of this year’s income from another account to spend on the CRL this year – on the basis that it would ‘repay’ the $8 million out of next year’s budget income of $110 million for this project.

BUT the public has not yet approved the Draft Plan proposal to the spending of that $110 million on the controversial Rail Loop in the next financial year, and the Government continues to confirm its refusal to fund any of the project.

So ratepayers funds are being spent this year on a project which may never happen – a project for which clear funding is nowhere in sight – and the Council is hell-bent on ignoring any submissions which might be made to its Draft Annual Plan.

This process makes a total mockery of the much-vaunted ‘consultation process’ – and is indicative of a new mind-set of those running the Supercity, a unlimited spending mind-set arising from the almost $2 billion annual rate take.

Another example of too much money in the hands of a tiny group of people – one of the major unsatisfactory outcomes of the Supercity organisation.

ENDS

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