Healthy signs for sport and recreation from Auckland Mayoral contest

Source: Aktive Auckland

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Tuesday 4 October, 2016

Aktive - Auckland Sport & Recreation has welcomed the commitment to continued sport and recreation investment from the majority of Auckland Mayoral candidates at the final mayoral debate on Tuesday night.

The Sport Matters debate was hosted by AUT at their North Campus and run by Aktive, who invests more than $8M per annum in the sector and is a strategic partner of Auckland Council and Sport New Zealand. It featured six of the leading hopefuls for Auckland’s top job: Vic Crone, Phil Goff, David Hay, John Palino, Chlöe Swarbrick and Mark Thomas.

The forum tested the candidates’ commitment to the importance of sport and recreation not just for its own sake but also to the wider community and to hear their plans for the future of the sector in New Zealand’s largest and fastest growing city.

"Sport and recreation has a far-reaching and positive impact to our city and the lives of Aucklanders," said Aktive CEO Sarah Sandley, "and is fitting to bring it to the forefront of the conversation alongside other key issues in this election."

"It improves educational as well as health and wellbeing outcomes, increases social connectivity and already makes a 1.76 billion dollar contribution to the local economy.

"If Auckland is to achieve the vision in the Auckland Plan of becoming the world’s most liveable city, it’s vital that we continue the investment path we are on to build on significant progress made in the last few years and tackle challenges inherent with a fast growing and diverse city."

That path has seen Auckland Council invest over $80M in new sport and recreation facilities per annum in recent years as part of an $800M commitment over ten years to 2025.

Key areas of interest were the candidates’ responses to questions about Auckland’s need for more spaces and places; whether that be through greenfield acquisition for additional areas or preservation of existing green space as well their views on a general commitment to preserve future spending commitments.

There was common agreement on the value of sport in society in health, economic and social outcomes but as expected there more nuanced positions on a number of related issues.

Vic Crone, was keen to reduce inefficiencies in council spending and had already targeted areas to realise savings but promised "not one dollar comes from sport and recreation or culture and arts."

Chlöe Swarbrick said that density and intensification done well would lead to citizens better utilising green spaces but also addressed the need to increase the number of spaces.

"I have placed huge emphasis on acquiring new parks as Auckland grows because as we intensify we are absolutely going to need to ensure we have those spaces available for public access," she said.

She also supported Bike Auckland initiative to allocate five per cent of the transport budget to safe cycling infrastructure.

Phil Goff echoed Swarbrick’s position on intensification and the pair also shared a view that central government needed to increase the share of money flowing back to local level to address the needs created by a rapidly growing city. Goff, however, wanted to slow down the projected numbers immigrating to Auckland to allow infrastructure to catch up.

He also indicated that council would be asked to find the same three to six per cent savings in sport and recreation as other departments but moved to allay fears of cuts.

"There’s not a risk to the sector unless there’s whole lot of fat in your system that I don’t know about and you don’t know about."

He also said savings could not be looked at in isolation when looking at the wider benefits of sport and recreation.

"You can’t just be a cost accountant knowing the cost of everything and value of nothing."

Mark Thomas said not enough progress had been made in the sport and recreation sector since the creation Auckland’s Sport and Recreation Strategic Action Plan and said a narrower focus was needed. He also wanted more private-public partnerships to achieve sport and recreation aims.

David Hay supported the current level of sport and recreation funding but proposed that rates be increased and replaced the money received from gaming trusts.

John Palino emphasised the need to intensify CBDs rather than suburbs and the creation of council-planned satellite cities would allow better planning of facilities for sport and recreation.

Dr Sandley said the general commitment to the value of sport and recreation investment, and access to informal and formal sport and recreational activities was pleasing for a sector that had made significant progress as a unified group since the establishment of Aktive and the creation of the Super City. She also emphasised the progress made and efficiencies gained since Aktive got up and running almost three years ago.

"We have been grateful for council support over the past few years and the sector has delivered strong results and importantly, value for money, over the last few years achieving more for the same funding, attracting more funding and bringing consistency to delivery across the region."

"We still have some significant challenges with issues like obesity and with certain communities and demographics within Auckland and we will continue to advocate that the sector is adequately funded to achieve aims that benefit the entire city through economic, heath and social dividends."

Sandley also promised to ensure the sport and recreation impacts of decisions on related issues like public transport investment and pricing policy for facilities and transport were heard at local and central government level.

Voting in Auckland’s local elections closes on Saturday 8 October with postal votes needing to be sent by Wednesday 5 October at the latest.

Additional Information

Aktive - Auckland Sport & Recreation is a charitable trust set up to achieve the vision of Auckland being the world’s most active city.

Aktive is committed to helping people and communities across Auckland to achieve sporting habits for life. We are a key strategic partner of Sport New Zealand, Auckland Council and major grant makers and funders. We invest more than $8m per annum in a range of delivery partners, organisations and projects that will get more people recreating and playing sport in Auckland, as well as creating more opportunities for coaches.

Every $1 invested in Aktive and the four local Regional Sports Trusts leverages more than $30 for the same participation goals.

Auckland’s sport and recreation sector employs almost 18,000 people and contributes 1.76 billion dollars to the regional economy. It makes a significant contribution to the health and wellbeing of Aucklanders, increases the social connectivity of communities and improves education outcomes for active children.

ENDS

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