Kate Hawkesby: Why do we have a stadium we can't use?

Eden Park has been forced to withdraw from holding the "Million Babies" LifePod Appeal concert. Photo / Brett Phibbs

Opinion

Why do we have a stadium we can't use? And why do we have a council which doesn't seem to want to allow events?

And why do we have an angry mob trying to shut down a fundraiser which has now morphed into a personal attack on its organiser?

Philanthropist Sir Ray Avery wanted a concert at Auckland's Eden Park on Waitangi Day to raise money for LifePods - incubators designed to help save the lives of babies around the world.

But Eden Park has bailed on it, saying time constraints and substantial Environment Court costs make it untenable.

The resource consent process was going to stretch beyond October and cost more than $1 million including the legal fees.

How ridiculous.

That is so prohibitively steep it's crazy.

We are so bowed down with red tape in this country it's a miracle we can get anything done.

I spoke to a builder the other day who said builders are going broke because they literally get held up for so long by council and consent procedures and delays that it becomes impossible for them to continue.

We need houses built, yet no one can build them because the bureaucracy to do so is so extreme and layered.

But back to Eden Park and the LifePod concert.

Lifepod naysayers have shocked Sir Ray Avery. Photo / Greg Bowker

Despite three-quarters of submissions to the resource consent process supporting it, 91 per cent of Aucklanders and 87 per cent of the surrounding community also on board, a small but angry mob of objectors kept coming out of the woodwork.

The most vocal appeared to be Helen Clark.

She even got personal in her attacks on the man himself. Why?

When did she become the self appointed spokeswoman for the Eden park community and the anti-LifePod fundraiser brigade?

Eden Park is a half billion dollar asset - what for?

A few games of rugby and some cricket, is that it?

Why was money spent doing up a stadium you don't want to make available to people?

This entire process has shone a light on how dysfunctional councils can be, how a minority of misery guts can hijack something decent and make it look criminal and how Auckland City is prepared to be held ransom to progress, by introspection, whining and bureaucratic BS.

Thanks for trying to do something good Sir Ray, and sorry the party poopers ruined it.