Auckland City Mayoral candidate Phil Goff says it's unlikely a busy debate schedule will help with voter turnout. Photo / Dean Purcell

Auckland 2016: Debates won't help with voter turnout - Goff

Author: Michael Sergel,
Publish Date: Thu, 8 Sept 2016, 5:48am

The busy schedule of mayoral debates isn't expected to increase voter turn-out at Auckland's council elections.

Mark Thomas, Phil Goff, David Hay, Penny Bright, John Palino and Vic Crone took part in last night's University of Auckland mayoral debate.

It was one of six debates being held in just two days, and one of dozens held over the past three months.

When asked about how voter turn-out could be increased, current frontrunner Phil Goff said the issue was complex and the debates probably weren't going to help.

He said debates attract people who are likely to vote and not the majority of "younger, ethnic, Maori and Pacific people" who don't vote.

22-year-old candidate and Auckland University alumni Chloe Swarbrick, the youngest of the 19 people standing for mayor, wasn't invited to be part of the debate.

However, she was allowed to deliver an impromptu speech, and used it to criticise the focus of other mayoral candidates in previous debates.

"The role of a leader and the role of your mayor is not be an auditor or an accountant. It's to represent you."

Council accused of spreading itself too far

Vic Crone said council money needed to be spent more wisely and the council needed to collaborate with businesses and organisations on major issues.

"We spend 60 billion dollars of your money and your future debt in a 10 year period in Auckland and we need better governance about how we spend that."

Mark Thomas said the council was trying to be too many things to too many people and needed to prioritise its spending, in line with submissions on last year's 10 year budget.

"What we've got to do [as a council] is have a more honest conversation. We can't fund this all by ourselves."

John Palino said ratepayers were being burdened with the costs of the city's growth when it wasn't their responsibility, and that burden needed to be shifted.

"It should be an investment not only for central government, for local council to grow Auckland in a way that generates revenue for them."

Migration and cycleways blamed for the housing crisis

The mayoral candidates offered very different solutions to the housing crisis and the growing number of people living in cardboard boxes, garages and cars.

Phil Goff said Auckland's current rate of growth wasn't sustainable and the city needed to turn down the tap of new migrants until it was ready to cope.

"When you have people coming in, you've got to make sure the infrastructure is there for them, the houses and the transport."

Environmentalist David Hay said the council should be selling its shares in Auckland Airport and scrapping vanity projects like dedicated cycleways until housing issues were addressed.

"We don't need a bright pink cycle path through Auckland when we have people living in the streets. That's a slap in the face to those people. It's the wrong priorities."

Activist Penny Bright said hundreds of currently empty state homes and council flats, which are jointly managed by the Government and Auckland Council, needed to be filled.

She said if she became mayor, "there will be people in those houses and the boards will be taken off the windows".