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If Left so keen on Living Wage, let’s have the vote again
Media release
Auckland Councillor Cameron
Brewer
Monday, 27 April 2015
If Left so keen on Living Wage, let’s have the vote again
Auckland Councillor Cameron Brewer says claims that a 2013 vote by councillors on the Living Wage was lost because of the Mayor’s affair is absolute rubbish and if the Left are still so keen on council adopting the policy, they should put it back on the table as part of Auckland Council’s 10-year budget to be finalised next month.
His comments follow the recent attempt by a local board to try to direct a contractor to pay swimming pool staff the Living Wage which was rightly over-ruled by the council CEO as beinginconsistent with the Governing Body's policy position.
“We’ve now got one Left-wing councillor strangely blaming fallout around the Mayor’s affair on the fact that the Living Wage did not get through. The reason the Living Wage did not get through on 19 December 2013 was that I put up a successful amendment that kicked it for touch, winning by 11 votes to 10.
“At that same meeting a clear majority of councillors also voted to give their confidence in the Mayor continuing in the job. Only five of us did not support him. So to blame the loss of the Living Wage on fallout around the Mayor’s affair is completely ill-logical and frankly only sour grapes.
“If the Centre-Left wants to have that debate and vote again then I encourage them to do just that. Given just how many demands are now on the council’s draft 10-year budget, they’ll get even less support than they did in 2013 and they know it.”
Mr Brewer says the Mayor made support for the Living Wage one of his "10 top issues" in his 2013 election campaign but then within weeks failed to get the votes to deliver it, and now has completely dropped the policy promise with no mention of it during the latest 10-year budget debates.”
“The Mayor knows he hasn’t got the numbers to deliver the Living Wage. If the Left think any differently then they now need to put up or shut up, and stop dreaming up poor excuses,” he says.
Ends
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