The councillor behind Auckland Council's TPPA debate is defending the talks, which lasted around an hour and a half.

Wayne Walker put forward a motion asking the Government to release the text of the controversial trade deal.

Walker said it's possible the council could be sued by overseas corporations and companies which is why they need to see the text.

"That means our council could be sued by some overseas or international company over a whole range of issues," Walker argued.

"I would've thought that the people of Auckland want to take a safe approach and a considered approach to any issue and if that means that there is some debate and there is some openness and transparency around that then that's a good thing."

But Councillor Denise Krum said the TPPA is outside the jurisdiction of local government.

"It really is getting ridiculous when we're spending two hours, rate payers' money, debating something that is not in the local Government's process possibilities ... I'm sure they'd prefer us to spend time on getting ideas on how to get rates down in our next annual plan."

A council meeting would ordinarily cost $20,000 an hour. 

CORRECTION - An earlier edition of this story stated that the meeting lasted two hours.