Auckland mayoral candidates give Government's intensification plans a roasting

Mayoral candidates at the Newmarket and Parnell Business Associations mayoral debate, Craig Lord (left), Efeso Collins and Viv Beck. Photo / Bernard Orsman

The next Mayor of Auckland could make life difficult for the Government's intensification plans across the city and the controversial Erebus memorial in Parnell.

Three of the four main mayoral candidates last night said they wouldn't stand for Government-imposed directives to allow for higher density housing, leading to the loss of kauri villas and bungalows.

Even the Labour-endorsed candidate Efeso Collins stood up for a middle ground proposed by the council to preserve 15,000 of the 21,000 homes with heritage values, but said he believes in intensification done well.

Auckland Mayoral Candidate Wayne Brown. Photo / Greg Bowker

"We have to plan for growth and a city that is going to be 2.4 million people in the next 18 years. That doesn't mean we take away the beauty of parts of Auckland," Collins said.

The issue came up at a mayoral debate held by the Parnell and Newmarket business associations and attended by about 150 people at the historic Jubilee Building in Parnell.

They were there to hear Collins, businessman Wayne Brown, Heart of the City chief executive Viv Beck and independent media operator Craig Lord.

Parnell is Auckland's oldest suburb and zoned for six-storey housing, said one question to the candidates, and "what will you do to stop this one-size fits all"?

Brown said he would wheel in all the Auckland MPs ahead of next year's general election and tell them "don't you dare do that" and start behaving like local MPs, not MPs from Wellington.

Beck said Auckland has to stand up to the Government, saying the edict from Wellington to build three homes of up to three storeys high on most sites with few planning rules will destroy the city's identity and character.

Auckland Mayoral Candidate Viv Beck. Photo / Greg Bowker

"Once it is gone, it's gone," she said.

Lord said the Government's failed KiwiBuild programme was behind the latest plans to build a lot of houses quickly.

"It is using a blunt tool and saying to developers, you are now city planners, go for gold," he said.

On a local contentious issue - the building of a memorial for the Erebus disaster at the Dove-Myer Robinson Park in Parnell - Collins got the only booing of the night when the candidates were asked to say "yes" or "no" to moving it.

Brown, Beck and Lord were in favour of moving the memorial, but Collins said he was "undecided".

One issue all four candidates agreed on was the protection of elite soils at the expense of urban sprawl, particularly around Pukekohe.

Brown said new housing being built at Paerata Heights, outside Pukekohe, was an error.

"We cannot afford to lose more of our elite growing soils and what is driving that is our rating policies. Rather than waiting for the Government to do something about it … we need a rating policy that doesn't penalise those people," he said.

Auckland Mayoral Candidate Craig Lord. Photo / Greg Bowker

Earlier this month, Environment Minister David Parker and Agriculture Minister Damien O'Connor released plans to protect elite soils.

About 14 per cent of New Zealand's land is categorised as highly productive.

"It's under increasing pressure from expanding urban areas and the growing number of lifestyle blocks," said Parker, when releasing a draft National Policy Statement for Highly Productive Land (NPS-HPL)