Len Brown is on record as saying he will front up.
“I will always front up. I will give you the straight answers, always with a limit.”
Unfortunately he added that rider, always with a limit. He is also on record with his beliefs about transparency.
“I clearly don’t give a damn about this stuff.”
“It’s critical for me as a point of basic principle as a leader and mayor of the city.
“I sit in this room. I don’t tell anybody I am having an interview with you today. It is between you and me. It is totally confidential.”
He said there was no requirement for him to disclose who he spent council money on.
“Transparency is not a perfect thing,”
Actually he is dead wrong on that point, he does have to disclose who he spent money on, so that also makes him a liar. The fact that he hasn’t makes him a liar who hides things. Transparency is not a perfect thing, indeed.
So, bearing those quotes in mind, one has to wonder now just exactly what the position is with the golden hand-shake of his lickspittle CEO, the guy who ran interference for Len over his expenses.
The Auditor-General has been called in to investigate lucrative golden handshakes being awarded to the chief executives of seven Auckland councils which are expected to cost ratepayers millions of dollars.
The Herald on Sunday has been told council bosses from Rodney to Franklin will receive redundancy packages with a combined cost of about $2.5 million.
The Auditor-General still hasn’t ruled on whether or not Len Brown has to tell the truth about his dinner at Volare. So I won;t be expecting any information to be forthcoming any time soon.
We do know that one council is squeaky clean though. Auckland City. We know this because Mayor John Banks does believe in transparency and transparency without limits.
Auckland City mayor John Banks has released the severance package of his chief executive David Rankin, and said there were no golden handshakes given to him by Auckland City Council. He called on other councils to do the same.
“Rankin will be paid an additional $30,000 because he has stayed on past his contractual arrangement. We didn’t want him to leave halfway through the year.
“Whereas the CEO of Manukau City has received a huge exit package, which has been kept secret as we can clearly understand it would.
“Ask Len Brown to tell you how much some of the poorest people in New Zealand have had to pay the CEO in golden handshake and golden exit packages.”
I’m pleased to see that Phil Twyford has been attempting to hold the councils to account.
Twyford had sent requests to all councils in Auckland under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act asking for the redundancy packages of executives.
Good on Phil Twyford, I suppose not having a seat to campaign for helps hugely time-wise. Though he seems a little confused as to who is responsible for holding the information, trying to pin the blame on Rodney Hide. Perhaps he should look a little closer to home politically, and ask Len Brown why he keeps secrets so much. Perhaps while he is at it he could also ask Len Brown just exactly who he was at dinner with at Volare. I mean he has been asked by LGOIMA and he refused, he is required by council rules to disclose and he refused.
I still can’t believe that Len Brown is running ads about opening the books when the books of his own council remain firmly shut to public scrutiny.
It seems we are seeing those limits that Len Brown talks about when he talks about transparency.
