When is Len Brown going to honour his promise of a referendum on Maori Seats for the Auckland Council?
He made this promise throughout the campaign, but has chickened out of a referendum. On Q&A he was trying to buy himself some wriggle room.
On TVNZ’s Q & A yesterday, Mr Brown said a referendum on creating Maori seats on the council “may well” be possible in the next three years
This blog has reminded him of his promise here, here and here.
Unkind souls probably feel that he is so busy trying to remember the 100 achievements in the first 100 days he has forgotten the Maori Seat Referendum. Hopefully when his highly talented spin weasel Conor Roberts gets back from holiday Len will miraculously remember the 48 missing achievements so we can stop the charade and get on with issues that matter. Like setting up the referendum.
Meanwhile we have Maori representation being foisted on us by stealth in a manner which Len Brown was never elected to do. Worse is Christine Fletchers attitude to the same move.
“I think this would surprise most Aucklanders, that Maori Statutory Board members that have not been elected by the public will be able to vote at committee meetings and arguably sway the vote and influence the result.”
Mr Brewer said the council was evenly split politically, so it was possible the two Maori votes could influence a result many times.
Citizens & Ratepayers co-leader Christine Fletcher welcomed the move to have two board members on committees.
“I think it can produce a really good partnership and I think they can be a really good balance between the different factions on council.”
Why is it that Christine Fletcher, apparently C&R and Maori along with Len Brown don’t seem to believe in democracy and want unelected people, appointees essentially having a disproportionate amount of representation and voting power. There is nothing in law or the treaty that suggests this should be the course of action, yet the Night-Mayor, enabled by hand-wringing liberals like Christine Fletcher that allows un-democratic tokenism to infect our systems.
We know what Len Brown thinks of open-nes and transparency, he showed us that with his secret meetings and board appointments. Now we know that Christine Fletcher also believes in un-elected, un-accountable , appointees holding the blalce of power in our city. She is wrong and so is Len Brown.
Len Brown needs to honour his promise for a referendum on Maori representation and he needs to stop making excuses.
