1 July 2004

Waitakere supports Supercars

Waitakere City Council last night decided unanimously to support the proposed V8 Supercar race in downtown Auckland.

The Council considered that provided traffic impacts can be managed, the event would have little effect on Waitakere residents and there would be a range of benefits for both the region and the country.

Mayor Bob Harvey told the Council that the V8 race was even better, in one way, than the America’s Cup because “we don’t have to win it in order to host it every year.”

This means that the benefits are available year after year. These include TV coverage to a world-wide audience of about 600 million, at least 550 part-time jobs, work for up to 60 companies and 30 or 40 associated events across the region including concerts, charity balls, go-kart racing, a yachting regatta, and a host of other community events.

“Many of those benefits will flow through to whole country,” he says.

Mr Harvey pointed out that Auckland had handled massive traffic re-organisation in the past, for events such as APEC and CHOGM and the council was confident that similar arrangements would be in place for the V8 races

ENDS

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>