Deborah Hill Cone: Auckland needs to redefine itself as 'one'

Deborah Hill Cone. Photo / Supplied

"I'm going to vote for HIM," said my friend, pointing at Len Brown in drag on the cover of Metro "Because he looks better in a dress and knows how to stand elegantly, with one leg over the other."

Oh dear. But since she is a bit of a geek she added as an afterthought: "Oh and he says his priorities are efficiency in governance and urban renewal." Oh well, as good a reason as any I suppose. Whatever those things mean.

The spring nights just fly by sitting around talking about the Super City election don't you find? It might be the biggest show in town but it is not - despite Metro's best efforts - immediately sexy to the average punter.

I know we should be interested - after all, you can't complain later otherwise.

Civic duty is never something that looms large when you are young, crazy and renting. It was only after I had kids that I realised that what happened out in City Hall had any real effect on my life - dog-walking regulations, usurious library fines, chopping down the big old oak tree outside my house, ugly rates bills.

Now we have the most profound local body election ever and I have to say picking candidates on their (photoshopped) dress sense seems as sane a response as any to the whole thing as any. Especially since this election is the grim one you just have to get over and done with as we forge an identity as a single city. It is going to take time to do that.

Aucklanders may have certain aligned interests - everyone wants to be able to get around the city without sitting in traffic jams for example - but on a visceral level we don't feel like a single city. We need to redefine our notions of who is "us" and who is "them". It sometimes seems the only time Aucklanders identify themselves as a single city is when they are joined in mutual loathing of Wellington politicians.

But until local body politics becomes something ordinary Aucklanders really do talk about over a glass of wine, we are going to struggle to be a single city.

When I lived in Manurewa people talked about pokie machines and tagging. In Devonport it was cycle lanes and trees. In Parnell it is plans for the bus park on the site of the old train sheds.

Civic duty still sounds uninspiring, but if we are going to be a single city we need to care about other people's concerns - "them" - not just "us". However that is dressed-up.

* From the New Zealand Herald feature, 'Super City - Election Guide'