Tuesday November 23 2004

Waitakere Mayor Elected Metro Mayor Chairman

Waitakere Mayor Bob Harvey has today been elected Chairman of Local Government New Zealand’s Metro Mayor’s Sector.

Elected to the position for the first time, Mr Harvey says it is a great honour because the issues that need to be tackled are large and go right across the country.

“One of our priorities is dealing with local government funding. It is clear we need to talk to the government about the fact rates, our only source of funding, is now unacceptable and unsustainable,” says Mr Harvey.

“We are also responsible for many public concerns such as law and order and the sector is a great way for all of the recently elected mayors to work together. We have already made a commitment to work closely with the government going into an election year.”

Mr Harvey, who was returned as Waitakere Mayor for a fifth term at the October elections, is also on the Mayors for Jobs Taskforce and is a UNESCO Mayor for Peace.

Metro Mayors is made up of mayoral representatives from the country’s metropolitan cities – Waitakere, Auckland, North Shore, Manukau, Hutt City, Upper Hutt, Porirua, Dunedin, Hamilton, Christchurch and Wellington.

At the sector’s first meeting today it also voted to admit Rodney and Papakura District Councils into the group.

ENDS

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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>>