KEY POINTS:
A row has erupted within the centre right Citizens & Ratepayers Now in Hobson after the non-selection of a community board member for one of three Auckland City Council slots.
Hobson community board member Julie Chambers yesterday said she was given no reason by the C&R Now executive for being rejected by the party executive after winning the support of local members at two indicative selection meetings.
"This is really a slap in the face for members who came out on two evenings to vote for candidates and I'm quite concerned about it," said Julie Chambers, who has been on the Hobson community board for eight years.
The executive, chaired by former National Party president John Slater, rejected Julie Chambers for Paul Goldsmith, who has written the biographies of former mayor John Banks and former National Party leader Don Brash and who stood in Maungakiekie and was 59 on the National Party list at the 2005 elections.
The executive endorsed two other candidates who won local backing at a second local meeting last Wednesday, political activist Aaron Bhatnagar and Auckland Rugby Union chairman Ken Baguley.
The centre-right ticket regards Hobson as a stronghold and is still smarting from losing two of the three seats to the anti-eastern highway ticket of Action Hobson at the 2004 local body elections.
Mr Slater would not say why the executive rejected Julie Chambers for Mr Goldsmith, but a C&R Now source said the selection process had been manipulated by people with hidden agendas.
Mr Slater said suggestions of hidden agendas and wrongdoing were "absolute nonsense". The source said the selection of three male candidates would bolster Action Hobson.
