All the talk these days is about Auckland being a different country.
It certainly has a big and ever-expanding population. It has its own flag - the Un-Real Estate For Sale is fluttering in every suburb.
It also has its own access to all-day traffic jams, a woefully under-resourced public transport system and a surfeit of those who consider wearing boat shoes confers a right to engage in dodgy financial practices. It has its own over-indulged loudmouth Tory royalty in the form of Mike Hosking and a Super-City council with no notion of planning for the future.
Rather than regarding Auckland as being a country all to itself and whingeing about the dominating influence of the City of House Sales, why don't the rest of us accede from the Union Jack-up and declare ourselves a Free Provincial Republic of Aotearoa?
We could then shuck off the shackles of Auckwardland and strike out on our own. Rather than be satisfied with becoming an outlying colonial staging post for them, let's leave them to their own devices while the provinces get on with the good life.