Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown in Auckland’s first electric double-decker bus. Photo / Dean Purcell
Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown isn’t ruling out another shot at the mayoralty next year.
“It’s a distinct possibility. But, I’m not saying yes or no just yet,” he told The Front Page.
Since winning office in 2022, Brown has never shied away from saying exactly what he thinks.
He’s waged war on council-controlled organisations, like Eke Panuku and Tātaki Auckland Unlimited, with proposals to abolish them altogether and bring their activities in-house.
Brown said last year would have been a good time to get rid of them.
“I have to bring my council with me and I have to bring the Government with me,” he said. “AT [Auckland Transport], which is a very widely disliked organisation, has adopted a very independent culture because it was granted independent status.
“What’s driving one of my actions here is that I don’t mind being criticised for things that I’ve actually done wrong. But I’m fed up with being criticised for things I don’t have much control over.
“I think I’m working pretty well with minister Simeon Brown over this and I’m looking forward to quite a good result out of this and some of the other things they’re doing.”
Brown needs to get councillors on board to fulfill his CCO (council-controlled organisation) reform. But when it comes to AT, Brown said he needs the Government to work with him.
“And to be fair to say to Simeon Brown, he’s doing a good job and he is, it’s not easy for him because he’s surrounded by Ministry of Transport, people who don’t really like to do anything much, just keep their job in Wellington,” he said.
Among the projects Brown wants to see finished by December is his dream of a new, open-air saltwater swimming pool at the Viaduct Harbour.
The 33m-long pool will be set around the Karanga Plaza tidal steps and enclosed by floating pontoons to separate swimmers from the harbour’s navigation channel.
The construction cost is about $500,000 and running costs will be $150,000 a year.
Brown also wants the pedestrian Te Wero footbridge, which connects the CBD and the Wynyard Quarter, fixed by the year’s end. While the bridge cost $3.7 million to build in 2011 – it’s costing council three times that, at $10.6m, to fix it.
“It had better be bloody open by Christmas. And you’d have to say it hasn’t been well managed over a period of time,” Brown said.
“We have a habit in Auckland of there’s nothing so permanent as something called temporary and that was a temporary one built years ago and it became permanent.
“Similarly, if you go down to Prince’s Wharf, there’s that weird-looking, cloud plastic building, which is deteriorating fast. That was built 15 years ago for two years and it’s still there,” he said.
The mayor spoke to The Front Page after his official visit to Brazil and ahead of heading to China today, with one main goal in mind.
“The shortest route from southern China to Brazil is if you fly and land in Auckland and head off to São Paulo. But, at the moment, no planes go there. I’m trying to encourage that to happen because the trade between Brazil and China is $490 billion.
“Even if we only get 1% of it, which we would do easily enough, I’m looking at about 4 or 5% of it, but 1% of it doubles the Auckland GDP. That’s how big this stuff is,” he said.
Today will be the first time in five years an official delegation from Auckland has gone to China – New Zealand’s biggest export market, worth more than $20b annually.
While attending meetings, the mayor will also speak at a function in Guangzhou recognising 35 years of Auckland’s sister city relationship.
Listen to the full episode to hear more about the mayor’s upcoming trip to China, and his thoughts on how safe Auckland is.
The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am. The podcast is presented by Chelsea Daniels, an Auckland-based journalist with a background in world news and crime/justice reporting who joined NZME in 2016.
You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Officers were photographed helping to paint protest signs.